Language of Love?
by Dr Mumpsimus
Summary: Martin has spoken his first words of love to Louisa and together they travel down the path from the Castle. This story begins soon after they embark on a different path together. With those first tentative steps and reserved words, together they endeavour to learn and share the language of love.
1. Chapter 1: Citoyen de Tendre

**Disclaimer: The story and characters of Doc Martin belong to Buffalo Pictures. This work of fan-fiction is for personal amusement only and no infringement of any kind is intended: actus non facit reum nisi mens sit rea**

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**Chapter 1: Citoyen de Tendre**

I AM NOT A MAN POSSESSED, like so many others, with an infatuation for electronic gadgetry and frivolous contrivances. There is no rectitude in so-called technology for technology's sake. Whereas I've studied Medicine, I can never abide a surgeon or a doctor who would employ such gadgetry as a sort of crutch for their indolence or as a pretence for their professional shortcomings. Theirs should be the greatest aspirations in the healing arts of paramount skills and knowledge by which to endeavour to fulfill their solemn duties for the preservation of life and the diminishment of suffering.

I have no quarrel with the advances of modern medicine that derive from modern technology, but rather the impression that it can ever be trusted as a substitute for proficiency and intellect. When it comes to technology that merits genuine admiration, I would attest by virtue of my surgical career, that there's no match for the fit, feel, and balance of an unassuming solidly-crafted stainless steel surgical instrument. In that solidness there is a sense of trust; trust within the hand of the surgeon and therefore emblematic of the trustworthiness in that surgeon's very hands. A professional who would suffer a flimsy tool or an inferior instrument concedes the title and relinquishes his trustworthiness and garners from me nothing but disdain.

The trust embodied in a truly fine timepiece shares the same provenance. There is nothing but pure integrity in a timepiece assembled of intricate yet solid clockworks made in the finest British tradition and crafted of materials of the utmost quality. This integrity reveals itself in the exquisite pirouettes of a compensated balance wheel eliciting a graceful glissade of an ingenious escapement mechanism actuating a choreography of delicately meshed precision gears set amongst precious jeweled bearings. Only the Divine Clockmaker Himself can truly appreciate the magnificence of such wondrous inner workings.

Tinkering with and restoring antique clocks, or horology as it is more properly known, has been my avocation since I was a schoolboy. It's a quiet, and I daresay even a relaxing, activity that allows me to focus my thoughts and attentions on the table before me laid out with the faulty, failing, and hitherto neglected mechanisms opened and exposed to my close examination. In exchange for their redemption they offer me the challenge and means to hone my dexterity, patience, and diagnostic skills. From an early age this practice imbued me with the capacity for intense concentration and exactness that would later serve me as an esteemed surgeon in the Ellingham family tradition.

That assiduous focus has endowed to me the interpretation in the murmurings of clocks for the slightest sounds of syncopation, or irregularities in the traces of their circumscribing hands, or the revealing reverberations from the pendulum's prosodic swing, or even the awry aroma of abraded metal with the presence or absence of lubricant. I thus learned to fully apply my senses to every detail and every part of my awareness to ascertain what makes them work and, as is more often the case, what doesn't and then to set about to repair and restore them to working order. An advantage of that focus is a measure of solace from the capricious, contradictory, and incommodious matters of this world, albeit temporarily. It is this diligence to diagnostics that has bestowed upon me my great purpose in life- be it devoted to clocks or devoted to people.

"Silence..." I mutter this unconsciously and listen again intently; stillness except for the subliminal tick-tock rhythm from what had been my penultimate project (a Wallingford reproduction) now adorning the kitchen wall at my left.

It has always, however, proven to be a far greater mystery to understand people and what precisely it is that makes them '_tick_'. I recall from an early age already fervently trying everything to understand my paradoxical parents and my enigmatic schoolmates. No power of observation proved sufficient to explain them in the same way as it did to clocks. As I grew up I devoted myself to understanding their analogous constituent parts and all their complex internal mechanisms, alas to no avail. All grown up I became a master at taking them apart and meticulously putting them back together, yet my attempts to understand people have always proved futile.

The surgery is presently bathed in darkness inside and out, save for the one kitchen light, and sitting here by myself my thoughts seemingly dart from one technical elaboration to another. That is (I expect) on account of the current PCT initiative. Members throughout Cornwall are being induced to upgrade their mobiles to the latest technology of what the rubbish-talking salesmen everywhere insist on calling _smartphones_. My initial reaction to this idea was to ponder how a smartphone could possibly help me in my Port Wenn surgery when it was quite difficult enough to find a receptionist _smart_ enough to simply _answer_ a plain-old _stupid_ one! Bear in mind that these are the same devices rumoured to unduly fascinate both common morons and singular imbeciles alike with inane games and vulgar noises in imitation of bodily functions. Hence my well-founded misgivings that this initiative might be tantamount to the same sort of nonsense I've feverishly railed against: frivolous reliance on mindless electronic contrivances.

Notwithstanding my reservations, the PCT persisted and even Chris Parsons himself made a personal entreaty to convince me of the initiative's merits. His most persuasive argument (admittedly) was that the adoption of new smartphone mobiles by GPs like myself, would make the patient records more readily available, particularly during home visits and emergencies. He also advised me that it would make it possible to access and view various medical images including tomography on the very same mobile devices as well as from remote farms and most expanses of the moor (the same capabilities will extend to the upgraded computers in the surgery once they too have been configured).

Of course Chris made the usual prosaic appeals of improvements from electronic records to efficiency, centralization, security and as Chris put it, "their- ahem, _waterproof_ qualities." I even listened in stony-silence as he ventured the hyperbolic argument that the device could very well, "broaden one's ability to communicate in the 21st century, Mart!" Only by virtue of our long acquaintance, I nonetheless heard him out and reminded him of my wide renown for both calm reason and consonant nature and went on to further assure him that the matter would garner my due consideration.

Thus following a good deal of research and study on the matter I am now, as of earlier today, the (entirely-modest) new owner of a smartphone. I made the purchase on my way back to Port Wenn and have just now spent the last couple of hours downloading, installing, and configuring the PCT programmes. It was not an easy task, mind you, the instructions were misleading sparse and buggered full of unintelligible terminology. Nonetheless I prevailed no doubt by reason of my technical prowess and surfeit patience, and I've just finished implementing that most important part of the initiative.

Most interestingly, in addition to the PCT software I've also just become aware that there are a number of other medical 'apps' (as they're known) available for the device: medical reference apps, medical transcription apps, apps to archives of medical journals, and even a growing array of apps together with peripheral instrumentation as well. These and a number of others are intended to greatly expand the device's usefulness. Considering all my investment in meticulous research on the subject, as well as having decided in advance exactly what and which model I intended to purchase, and had determined precisely how much I expected to pay, all the bloody salesman had to do at the time of the purchase was swipe my credit card to complete the transaction.

That is until (as is a common trait among chronic morons) the salesman opened his annoying mouth. This mere adolescent in an ill-fitting suit with an intellect even more challenged than his complexion, had the condescending cheek to treat me like an illiterate troglodyte simply because I had never in my life previously owned a smartphone nor had ever used one. Even now when I think about the audacity of this bilious imbecile it makes my blood boil, a most unpropitious metaphor considering my erstwhile blood issue. This idiot went on to conceive that he should apprise me of the various apps to go along with the device that he thought I might _enjoy_.

He went so far as to recommend- to _me_- a _game_, a ridiculous _game_; a game popular for preoccupying prize half-wits involving missiles of malicious fowl. Imagine the impertinence that I would wish to engage in some mindless game when my existence in this god-forsaken village is already an authentic hit-and-miss contest with Port Wenn's foul seabirds! For too long already my daily experience has been to assume the role of angry paladin playing against my avian-antagonists that hurl, not themselves, but a constant barrage of their disgusting by-products! Were this an actual game, it would be better entitled from the term for those very by-products! (which just so happens to rhyme with the word 'birds'!). God help the bloody fool!

Yet, for the briefest of moments between the salesman's effrontery and the full-scale fulmination that ensued, one particular app did manage to capture my attention. Since I was decidedly not about to give that loathsome prat any sort of satisfaction by inquiring with him about it- the idea of it has been pushed to the back of my mind ever since to percolate. Yet with my agitated state comes the niggling sense that this app amounts to _help_ and thus constitutes another affront to my forbearance and dignity (even more so for its mawkishness). Its very contemplation questions whether I may have failed to inoculate myself against the village's latest outbreak of stupidity and inanity. Perhaps I've lost my assumed immunity or succumbed to a previously unknown strain? Perhaps this consternation accounts for the true cause of my inconstancy of thought this evening.

"Ahh..." I let a deeply somatic sigh issue into the stillness of the night and return my gaze at the clock's face.

The stark truth is that I learned long ago that I was rather better off speaking in curt monosyllables and terse retorts. It has always been for the best to restrict further discourse to harangues about health or elaborate medical evaluations or adroit Latin terminology or on occasion, all three at once: _'Caput tuum velle tuum a clunes!'_ I daresay that I learned to speak it so well, that for most of my life there was little more that needed to be said and little more that I had any compunction to say. To say more was to admittedly risk the unfortunately too familiar personal medical crisis of getting my foot stuck firmly in my mouth.

So then why do I find myself returning to the same question of why that shouldn't be enough? What would compel me to risk my hard-earned dignity and poise for the possibility of more than that; let alone deign to seek actual _help_ to do what I should well be able to do on my own? What vilely officious spirit would possess me? It could only be... Oh, what was the name of that bloody damn app anyways? It had a rather silly obscure name that I'm hoping I can properly remember. I'll just do a search here for it then. Let's type in what I might possibly recall... Hmm, that looks right. Ah, there it is... Now let's select it here and...

"Hmm... "

"_CyraKnow_™ _is an intelligent personal romance navigator app that uses a spoken natural language interface for personalized romantic interaction to provide the user complete fluency in the language of love. __CyraKnow_™ uses the world's most powerful database of the greatest romantics, poets, and lovers of all time to personalize and optimize your every romantic encounter. Voice recognition input and synthesized voice output interact to prompt and guide the user through every romantic exchange.

_You begin to use __CyraKnow_™ by entering basic information to establish your personal profile and the profile of your beloved that _CyraKnow_™ uses in its romance algorithms. As you use _CyraKnow_™, its heuristic knowledge extends these profiles by learning individual preferences to personalize responsive prompts of what to say for maximum romantic results.

_Whether you are a Don Juan or a Don Yawn or merely amongst the masses of romantically challenged, __CyraKnow_™ helps you to speak eloquently, passionately, and seductively with complete panache. Download and install _CyraKnow_™' today and tell your beloved of your deepest and most intimate feelings they long to hear spoken in the language of love."

Might I yet hope to say to Louisa all those things I have longed to tell her from the instant I first set eyes on her? Might I yet tell her all the things she undoubtedly has longed to hear me say? Or does this device and its app amount to more of the technological tosh that I despise like housekeeping robots, personal jet packs, and Star Trek-like omniscient medical scanners? The thing is, I have no need for a worthless housekeeping robot or a preposterous jet pack or an entirely redundant medical scanner. But what I do _need_ is Louisa. If the risk is a name for myself of placing my foot in my mouth once again then I might as well aspire to devise the eponymous surgical procedure for extracting it, perchance something like '_Ellinghamplasty_'. Tomorrow whilst the surgery is quiet, I shall have time enough to prepare it and just before the ideal opportunity to put it to use.

**6/24/12 to be continued...**

**(edited 8/5/12)**


	2. Chapter 2: Nouvelle Amitié

**Chapter 2: Nouvelle Amitié**

MORNING IS APPROACHING FAST and lying here on the verge of wakefulness everything feels desperately cold and so bitterly lonely. The same dismal description applies to countless days across a relentlessly barren term of life. The antecedent nights were likewise affairs of solitude devoid of nary a prospect of there being more to existence. Even the intercession of sleep was awash with surreal processions of imagery of careworn clockworks refusing to mesh or successions of bite-grasp-pull-and-throws of unending sutures that never fully stem the flow of blood. To proceed with these torpid thoughts now risks descent into the mindset of that most hellish time of my heart's near debridement†.

The sole consolation through life (as it were) had once been a purpose, which is to say, an imperative as a surgeon. Yet even then I was to be dispossessed of that measure of solace once a paradoxical paroxysm struck. One unexceptional day long ago the gods engineered a most stultifying fall from grace that would blamelessly end my surgical career and banish me to the backwater village of Port Wenn. Not content with merely my ruination, they sought to torment me with sweetly tantalizing, yet no doubt, irredeemable redemption by the name of Louisa Glasson. But what Faustian bargain might be exacted, surely executed in blood (of all things), to be joined with that heavenly design? But for a glimpse? What compact I'd inscribe for no more than a glimpse? And then the moment happened: the moment I would tarry for _more_ than just a glimpse, a glimpse of Louisa who "art so fair". My one last chance. _Sola gratia_.

There has been a sense of togetherness in these past few weeks since of an unaccustomed tenderness. Only the ebb of sleep's stupor allows me to realize that the night nearly passed now is but one exception to this time we've not been apart. Louisa is, at this moment, in London to attend an annual conference for primary school heads. Most remarkable of all is the realization that it was me who had proposed and encouraged Louisa to attend, in spite of the nearly two unbearable days we'd be apart. And to think: she had initially been more than ready to send a subordinate in her stead and no one, and most conspicuously myself, would have given it a second thought had she given it a miss to stay close to home with her infant son.

I surely startled myself as much as I had startled Louisa by urging her to attend like in past years. She objected at first that her attendance would simply be too soon: too soon for James Henry, too soon for her, and still too soon for us. But still I persisted in a series of exchanges of reassurances, protestations, consolations, suspicions, tears, exhortations, and more tears to justify it nonetheless. Of course much of this drama might have been avoided had I understood earlier what her career meant to her and had not demeaned it for so long. Perhaps nothing I had said in the end convinced her, I cannot be sure. But there was a pleasing warmth in doing it for her, a warmth that I can still feel that is quickly commuting the bed's passing cold.

This warmth will sustain me through the demands of the day ahead, more so the sun that rises and begins to peek through the window. Perhaps not nearly as warm nor as sustaining as mornings from these past few weeks awakening with Louisa braced in my arms where she can barely suppress her reflexive smile to puckishly use that peculiarly odd voice of hers to aver, "Optimal sexual value." Or with morning's increasing glow her ardent speechlessness is moved to purr my name so I can watch her alabaster skin blush rosily as she tells me, "Oh Martin, sighs matters."

But, very soon now, our beautiful son will be announcing his welcome to the day and I am eager to greet it with him. He's simply more amazing than anything life might ever have prepared me for. Already we communicate so easily. He'll natter on and on about a favoured stuffed animal or blanket or he'll press himself firmly against my chest to earnestly examine the lub-dub of my heart's systole-diastole rhythm. We do always enjoy a well-spirited chat about contentions in the latest journal articles or the marvels of anatomy and his nascent mastery over his own. And then at our most special times we'll discuss his Mum and just how fortunate we both are to have her; frequently without the needless expenditure of words. I'm filled beyond overflowing watching his wordless expressions that bring such joy and happiness to his sweet Mum's heart. Yet soon enough, the sounds will form and their meanings will assert themselves and the words will flow, and he'll win her heart all over again with both exclaimed and whispered expressions of love and affection. How could we not help to become a practised pair by then? Yet the time has come to rouse myself out of bed since along with the impending daybreak, the son also rises.

"Well, we are nearly ready now that we're both fed, cleaned, groomed, and attired in our respective uniforms, yes? It's a busy day ahead too. Before your Dad can attend his surgery to start his day, we'll need to take a stroll too before you can begin yours.

"Of course, of course, how could I possibly forget?" I answer James Henry's keen expression of gurgles as he sits waiting in his pushchair. "And you're quite right too- your Mum will be ringing us very soon to hear from her precious boy before our day's adventures could possibly get underway!"

Louisa will undoubtedly be awake by now too and will likely be frantically getting ready for the early start to her day's meetings. She rang last night speaking tearfully of her anguished sense of separation that was made no better by her first day's opening meetings (not to mention the ghastly socializing to be done over dinner). She lamented of the terrible emptiness of her hotel room and of the difficulty of enduring without her precious son and well, me too. She has missed doting on him maybe most of all, something I would miss very much as well.

It means such a great deal to me to dote on our son; so much so that I have questioned that most reliable of my emotions, my sense of duty. Maybe it's not an actual emotion but, arguably since my own childhood, it's the most reliable that I've known. The question I've asked myself is what if Louisa requires more than my duty to, well... that is to say- attend to the contents of soiled nappies? Or any duty to care for James Henry or even herself for that matter? I might have first suspected that duty was not enough when I'd invoked it to express my concern for Louisa's and our then unborn baby's welfare (had I not been consumed by grievous resentment at its rejection!). What perhaps transcends it now is something both novel and strange and maybe even a little unsettling. Perhaps what is developing; what's begun to be experienced is, that is to describe in the vernacular, I suppose might be described as, well- _friendship_. Maybe it's on that account that I can conjure a small bright spot in the midst of her likely morning rush (and thus best not shared with Louisa): I'm at least spared witness to the state of Louisa's hotel room.

I'm standing just off the kitchen finishing off refreshing the supplies to the nappy bag when the telephone rings. A quick glance while both my hands are engaged, confirms that it's Louisa as I nudge the button to have it answer on speaker.

"Louisa- good morning."

"Good morning, Martin! Good morning, James Henry! How is Mum's sweet boy today? It's Mummy, James! How was he, Martin? How are you? Oh, I've missed you- I missed you both so much!"

"He's fine- we're fine, and he did miss you," I said. "And, I do too; that is, miss you."

"I'm so sorry I'm running late this morning; I was afraid that I might miss you two- well I did, but- well, you know what I mean. It was just so unbearably lonely and desolate in the middle of the night, other than the truly awful music coming from somewhere across the hall. Anyway, I had the worst time trying to get back to sleep because of it. Crazy, I know, considering how I'm still catching up.

"Martin, I did discover the loveliest little card tucked into my bag this morning, and well, I couldn't even be sure of your writing at first, but it is just so beautiful, such beautiful words- my heart just leapt! Wherever did you find them? First you give me our beautiful son and now this! Thank you."

"That's not... um, I mean- you're welcome," I stammer my relapsing awkwardness.

"Martin, I'm sorry- I didn't want to make you feel... It's just to hear those words, or I should say, read them, it made me feel so wonderful. And to think that just before I had been feeling so truly awful. I woke up this morning trying to imagine a feeling even worse than not being with you and James Henry..." she pauses abruptly. "Martin, I'm going to skip the rest of this silly conference and take the next train back as soon..."

"No, no, no- we talked about this. I know how important the conference is and..."

"Why, what is it? Maybe you don't want me back so soon?" she challenges me, "Perhaps you're enjoying much less chaos in your life? Maybe it's all a bit of a relief to you? Maybe..."

"No, Louisa! I do. I am. I mean I'm not. I mean, yes- I do want you back- desperately, and no I could never enjoy anything. Not, I mean, without you," I barely manage to express and subdue the tempest of doubt without palpitations and beads of cold sweat dappling my brow. How the plainest of words can leave me paralyzed, speechless, dumb and seems to get the best of me, by which I mean the worst of me- oh god, even now...

"That's better," her tone mercifully assuaged after a tortuous pause. "It's just for all the fuss I've made about my career. I hope it didn't make me sound impetuous or selfish or just plain ridiculous. I'm sorry, Martin. I still can't forgive myself if I ever made myself sound so self-important about my career and what I wanted and what I wanted for you to want and... Martin... are you still there, Martin?"

"Yes- I am. I'm just..." I catch myself enchanted by its mellifluence, "It's your voice."

"Why? What's wrong with my voice?"

"It may be nothing," I'm suddenly prepossessed with improbably spurious diagnoses of spasmodic dysphonia, "I should examine you."

"Right. Well, don't worry, Martin. I know that the telephone is barely a step removed from actual privacy. But honestly, I really could come home right away, you know. You could read to me, in such a voice, you could read to me; you know from your book or wherever you came across those wonderful words for page after page after..."

There is a growing expression on James Henry's face right now that is penetratingly equal parts quizzical, expectant, inspired, impatient, chagrined, and simultaneously hopeful. That look seems to be compelling me do it justice and to take command until I finally do reach for the headset to talk and, at least temporarily, keep Louisa's voice for myself.

"Louisa, the conference will be over by tomorrow and you'll be home before you know it... Yes, I know, but we talked about this. I recognize that Port Wenn Primary is counting on you too... Please count on me then too... I do too. Tomorrow... tomorrow Louisa- we'll come to pick you up at the station and later, I have a plan for later- just the two of us. The baby can stay over and we can have dinner- out together, just the two of us and... Louisa? Louisa, are you still there?... No, I'm fine... No, I've not contracted anything that I'm aware of..."

"Waa!" our son is wont to intone this opening note to one of two well rehearsed passages; either calando or incalzando.

"...Yes," I acknowledge Louisa's request into the telephone and switch it back to the speaker.

"James! James, my darling boy! Piggy widden††, piggy widden, my sweet," her charm suffused incantation gently comforts him in a way that still eludes me and charms me just the same, "shhh... piggy widden, my love."

A reassuring quietude returns.

"Mummy has to go now, love- and you too, Daddy. Be good for your Daddy today. Bye-bye, James Henry. Goodbye, my Martin- tomorrow can't come soon enough then. I'll call again tonight- same time as last night," and then too soon her voice rushes away.

**7/8/12 to be continued...**

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†**debridement**- the (usually surgical) removal of lacerated, devitalized, or contaminated tissue to promote healing in the remaining tissue, often requiring revascularization of the surrounding tissue.

††**Piggy widden**- a Cornish phrase used to calm babies, alludes to the littlest of all baby pigs.


	3. Chapter 3: Complaisance

**Chapter 3: Complaisance**

PORT WENN HAS LONG BEEN A SHELTER from the storms blown in from well beyond its small crescent-shaped harbour. Many a distressed seafarer and souls long-adrift have found comfort here together with some measure of protection from the harsher elements of the world and the open sea. It was some years ago that a certain young lad was carried by wind and tide to spend the best of his summers here, far from distant London and far from his even more distant and self-absorbed parents. Here too some years ago, there lived a local girl with an earnest smile who fashioned from the village a refuge from the uncertainty of a tempestuous family life. To many other past and present inhabitants of Port Wenn, it was deemed a sanctuary where, for a time, they could leave their troubles behind long enough for the fiercest of life's squalls to pass. And others still found themselves returning to it under perfectly serene and pleasant skies for the surety they'd once known there in former inclement times.

Joy Cronk was one of those who'd left the village only to return to Port Wenn just a couple of years later. She'd lived here originally as a single parent to a rather precocious young son, but returned recently now remarried to a devoted husband with a career as an university professor in Cornwall. Together they are the adoring parents of a toddling daughter who delights in all their attentions, especially those from her cherished big brother, Peter. Port Wenn represents to them an untroubled anchorage for a young child to grow and blossom. Whilst much of Peter's early boyhood days in the village had often felt restrictive and shoaly, his present exposure to the wider world at a prestigious grammar school has greatly moderated that view. Now he returns home to Port Wenn on weekends and holidays and regards it as the quintessential home that he'll fondly remember for all of his days.

"Good morning, Mrs. Cronk-Wallace."

"Good morning- Doctor Ellingham," she hesitates ever so slightly as a hint of my regression from our first name greetings of late, "and good morning to you, James Henry!"

I watched my son's face light up at the greeting as he burbles a heartfelt reply. It's with growing amazement that I watch such displays by my animated son that elicit nothing but pleasant responses to all his expressions and specialness. He has a quick warmth and easiness with others that makes me marvel more and more with every passing day. Was it entirely irrational of me to imagine at one time that this delightful child could ever be condemned with a demeanor of sturm und drang? Perhaps only because providence had favoured him with none other than Louisa as his mother and maker.

"You're both well rested, then?"

"Yes, he's slept mostly, I'd say."

"Good," she smiled, "and with Louisa away as well."

"Yes, she talked to him over the phone which helped soothe him considerably before his bedtime," to which I didn't add any allusion of Louisa's distress over the separation once James had faded off to sleep.

"Good, good."

"And I was wondering- Joy, if I might ask for your help concerning tomorrow evening?"

"Why certainly," she said with a smile at my renewed effort of congeniality.

"Would it be possible for you to mind James Henry for us here tomorrow evening?"

"Yes, well- I'd be happy to help. Actually, Peter would be keen to spend time with your little James Henry too. He'll be home tonight with Andrew and in fact, Peter was eager to ask you for your help on a project for school."

"Ah, yes..."

"Drockter pleese. Drockter, pleese. Drockter!"

"Kenna, we do not interrupt other people in the middle of their conversation."

"Sorry, Drockter Ellyham," the chastened two-year old girl apologized with downcast eyes used for great effect.

"I'm sorry Doctor Ell-ing-ham, you were saying," her mother carefully enunciated my name as she turned back to me.

"Yes, tell Peter to see me if I can be of any assistance."

A protracted silent pause ensued as we adults had finished talking and Joy's daughter stood patiently looking up at us with her eyes now attentively darting back and forth until she finally dared to speak, "Can I talk now, pleese?"

"Yes, Kenna. We've finished that conversation and you may now ask Doctor Ell-ing-ham your question."

"Drockter Ell-y-ham, Zames and me are going to look for bubberflies today at the park and I maked this pitcher," she revealed a coloring from behind her back and proudly held it aloft to me. "It's for you!"

"Ah, yes. That looks like a '_painted lady'_. Its other name is '_Vanessa cardui'_; you may still see some there flying about this time of year."

"_Vanessa Car-doo-eye_. Zames, Zames! It's a _Vanessa Car-doo-eye,_" she stood face-to-face with James in his pushchair and carefully sounded out the butterfly's Latin name to his complete and utter delight. James' face lit up and his arms and legs were now beating so exuberantly that I could well believe that he'd be taking wing himself at any moment.

"Drokter, what do we say when someone gives us something?" she admonished me gently.

"Umm, thank you- Kenna."

.***

As I make my way back up the hill to the surgery, I see my first patient of the morning already at the door waiting for his appointment.

"Good Morning, Doc."

"Good morning, Al. Go on through," I guide him inside and into the consulting room despite his negligible earliness.

"Please have a seat," I motion to Al as I do similarly behind my desk, "What seems to be the matter?"

"Well, I've had this feeling lately- a sort of a tightness in my chest. It feels like it's hard breathin' at times actually. Almost as if I'm being squeezed into a jumper a few sizes too small."

"Is this a persistent feeling? And how long does it last after onset?

"No, it happens for only for a few minutes or so and then it's gone. But it comes maybe two- three times a week. Sometimes it comes on jus' as I'm standin' around or things are slow at the restaurant or once in awhile when I'm jus' lying in bed tryin' to get to sleep, you know?"

"Would you roll up your sleeve for me please," I instruct him as I rise to pull the examination cart over to his chair. "Would you be undergoing any extra or unusual stress?"

"Unusual? Well, that's a tough one- unusual, hmm... No. No, not really I'd hav'to say. Well, you know how it can be when Dad's condition flares up, eh?"

"His condition?"

"Oh, you know how it is- meanin' Dad's reality-deficit disorder. I s'pose it's always a bit of an adventure with Dad, innit?"

"Ah, right. Perhaps this means that the restaurant's experiment with Oktoberfest has finally come to an abrupt end?"

"Hah, ha! You'll be pleased to know that Dad has hung up his lederhosen for good."

"And the grass skirt from before that?"

"Yes, we have no bananas- and no coconuts and definitely no more Polynesian Luau Nights, neither."

"So then maybe you can tell me exactly what overly loud music I can expect to be asking you to turn down next?" I inquire with a final squeeze on the sphygmomanometer bulb.

"Well, let's see now... Dad's just caught me unawares with a massive new freezer cabinet we can't afford, so lemme think. Hmm, any idea'r then what music and outfits them eskimo people fancy?" he asks rhetorically.

"Mmm... " my examination proceeds. "Your blood pressure is somewhat elevated. Have you been suffering from more frequent headaches, lightheadedness, dizziness- or have there been any episodes of fainting?"

"No, not had any of 'em."

"Al, your overall health remains good- but you are far too young to be presenting symptoms of hypertension. You will need to start watching your salt intake and we'll have to monitor your blood pressure more closely. If you should ever begin to experience any sort of undue _stress_, then it's important that you begin to address it straightaway before there are cascading effects to your health."

"Hmm... any idea'rs how I might manage to accomplish that then, Doc?"

"Well, be more relaxed; learn to take it easy, don't allow people or situations to get to you, change what you can and accept what you can't. The usual prescriptions, really."

Al stares blankly at me for a preternaturally long pause that eventually gives way to a steady nod, "Right. Good advice."

"Anything else?"

"No. No, I s'pose not," he stands up and lumbers towards the door before he turns back and brightens, "Hey, Doc?"

"Al?"

"Had me a lit'le note from Pauline- she wanted me to tell you hello- _'hello'_. She wanted to say that she s'pects to be nursing full-time by next year."

"Ah, good," this is my first news of Pauline in a while although Al's pursed face belies a more solicitous look. "Have you seen her since she left the village?"

"Seen Paul? No. No, every time I make plans for visitin' Bristol- she gets way too busy and well, I s'pose I am as well with the restaurant and ev'rythin' going on at Ruth's farm," he smiles uncomfortably. "When I mentioned it to Dad, like always, he can't help himself from dispensin' doses of his wisdom. He says to me, 'Son, when it comes to relationships, men _have no choice _but to try harder.' He likes to say that that's 'How men compensate for their havin' a natural fear of _being committed_'."

"Right," I say as the two of us exchange phlegmatic nods. "Let's make that next appointment for two week's time."

A palliative prescription comes to mind as Al starts to leave once more before I call him back, "Oh, Al- if things haven't improved by that next appointment, then plan on spending some time on holiday afterwards. I'll make that doctor's orders then- if need be."

**7/14/12 to be continued...**


	4. Chapter 4: Soumission

**Chapter 4: Soumission**

"THANKS, DOC."

"Al."

Al, rather to his credit, is one of the select few in this village with any marked intelligence. However he does lack my level of education and my depth of intellectual insight and of course my cardiovascular seeming to be toffee-nosed or even veinglorious on the subject, Al can hardly be expected to grasp the subtle workings of the human heart, as I do. Being without my extensive training and my broad understanding, he is likely blind to all the physiological, anatomical, and aetiological implications of high blood pressure. Yet the matters of the heart have been the greatest of all mysteries, as the heart (to wit): _is the beginning of life; the sun of the microcosm, even as the sun in his turn might well be designated the heart of the world; for it is the heart by whose virtue and pulse the blood is moved, perfected, and made nutrient, and is preserved from corruption and coagulation; it is the household divinity which, discharging its function, nourishes, cherishes, quickens the whole body, and is indeed the foundation of life, the source of all action._†

Science and medicine once explained the essential role and purpose of the heart this way: the heart functions to generate bodily heat; the lungs push the blood throughout the body to radiate that heat; and the blood itself is produced by the liver from where it is distributed for consumption by the other organs of the body. These notions, preposterous to modern knowledge, were accepted well into the 18th century as sacred and incontrovertible truth. William Harvey, another man of science and a fellow Englishman, is responsible for overthrowing the then existing and well established, yet entirely unsupported, beliefs with the publishing of _De Motu Cordis et Sanguinis_. Yet so iconoclastic were Harvey's ideas that it took another hundred years for them to supplant what remained the sacred orthodoxy.

What made Harvey's ideas so heretical were his unassailable tests upon the preconceived notions of the time. He posited that if the blood actually originated in the liver and was constantly being used up without recirculation, then by basic measurement and calculation an average sized person would have to produce over five-hundred pounds of blood each and every day! To determine what the heart was actually doing he simply tied off the veins of a live specimen, and observed that the heart would soon empty of blood. Whereas if the arteries were tied closed, the heart would swell with a surplus of blood. To explain the tiny bumps within the veins he tried forcing the blood to flow in the one direction where it would flow naturally, whilst in the other direction the bumps act as tiny valves preventing the blood from flowing at all. Thus developed the theory we know today as fact: the heart is a pump that circulates the blood continuously throughout the body in one direction and one direction only.

What works, and what does not; which outcome is desirable, and which is not. When it comes to achieving true understanding these are the basic tenets of science and medicine as well as the fundamental principles of the everyday process of learning. That is what Harvey's reasoned discoveries exemplify. It's also why deliberate bleeding of patients eventually ended too, albeit centuries later, by my barber-surgeon predecessors who so happened hadn't actually 'cured' high blood pressure or its consequences, but had merely reduced the total volume of blood. Yet, as the lone man of science and one of the few practitioners of 'thinking' within a five mile radius of this village, I find myself still surrounded by nine-hundred and sixty-seven people who all know better.

Of course Al does have the considerable hindrance of his upbringing and that utterly clueless father of his. What was it that Al just said that he attributed to that scholar amongst simpletons? "Men's fear of _being committed_," what an idiot; if anyone ought to be committed it's that Bert Large. I can well imagine Bert oversimplifying his son's diagnosis or any of the matters of the heart with another of his barmy bromides, "Just go with the _flow_," he'd crow. Moron.

As I finally follow Al out of the consulting room, I can't help but note the great many patients already queued for today's surgery. A fair number of them, as would seem to be the case lately, are generally older boys, really, or perhaps technically younger men (_adultescents_ nonetheless); all of whom would be fairly challenged to make any such distinction themselves- or is that just the case in bodmin Port Wenn? This sort here have, gawd knows why, become more frequent patients of late with increasingly moronic symptoms and inane complaints of one sort or another. Most are generally past the age of contriving illness so as to simply avoid school, not that more schooling is bound to do them much good at this stage.

"Morwenna, next patient please," I say and have to wait and watch and wait some more; growing more narky by the second. "Morwenna!"

"Yes, Doc! Billy Tars- go on!" she dismisses the muscular overgrown pillock hovering over her desk with a flourish as she espies my furrowed brow.

"Go on, you scary git!" she further evinces with an exaggerated arm and finger pointing towards the consulting room. If Morwenna is feigning a performance to mask her impertinence hoping to spare herself a reprimand for socialising with her friends in my surgery- she will rue the day.

"Ah..." I manage to say as my patient turns to approach the consulting room and his blotchy facial lesions come conspicuously into view and I am soon preoccupied with how it's presenting exclusively to the right side of his face and arm, "yes, go through."

"It's my rash, Doc. It's really, really starting to hurt now. Couldn't it be some sort of viral infatuation?"

"Mmm. Do you work on the fishing boats or have you been handling fishing nets or equipment?"

"Not anymore. My Dad says he's waiting to land a fish who can't outwit me- whate're that means. Why?"

"Ah, I had a theory that you've just invalidated," my first impression had been another incidence of erysipiloid†† like Mr. What's-it's recent case, though that possibility was now rather unlikely, "When you say 'hurting', do you mean painful or itchy?"

"No, really painful. And your receptionist says I'm scarin' every sprog and dog in the village wearin' this face."

"These lesions- er, pimples together with the rash, did they both first appear at about the same time?"

"Yeah, 'bout three days ago on my face. Been off school and everythin'."

"I saw you at the end of the summer for a case of diarrhea and abdominal cramps," I vividly recollect the patient's medical history (as always) but peruse his patient record all the same. "You did finish the full course of antibiotics I prescribed you and without any recurrence?"

"Yeah, fixed me right up. Took a bit a time, but no more problems," he scarcely reassured me given his look and age. It didn't require much imagination to believe that he ate endlessly with the slightest regard to nutrition or sell-by or contaminants of any kind. Equally doubtful was whether he heeded proper hygiene between likely bouts of shoving food into his bottomless maw.

"Could you have changed your washing up habits lately or perhaps your mother has changed laundering routines or started using different products?"

"No, don't think anything's changed."

"Has the rash spread anywhere else?"

"Yeah," he's quick to unbutton his shirt and reveal many of the same lesions along his shoulder and upper arm- again all entirely confined to the right side.

"And the genitals? The buttocks?" which is more of a directive than an inquiry as I am already standing and snapping on my examination gloves.

"Won't be necessary, Doc," the athletic but entirely gormless boy answers me as my practiced glower informs him otherwise.

"Right, then. No other affected areas then. This swab will be sent to the lab to isolate the cause of the infection. I'll start you on an antibiotic course of amoxicillin-clavulanic acid to start and you can take paracetamol for the pain. You'll need to stay off school and your mother needs to change your bedsheets daily. You'll need to go to the chemist's right away and make another appointment for one week's time when we'll have the lab results."

"Okay then, Doc- whate'er you say. You are the suppository of wisdom 'round here."

"And make sure to avoid all contact with others," this amendment to my instructions meets a dull, blank and, using Morwenna's apt term, 'scary' expression staring back at me. "Are we done?"

"Yeah..." he lingers uneasily which I recognize in my experience as preceding a disclosure of some embarrassing symptom or some terrible deeply held secret. "Well, I was kinda wonderin'- your receptionist, she got herself a boyfriend or anythin'?"

Following my wordless response and his dismissal, I take but a moment to bin my gloves and seal the swab for collection and I'm ready to summon my next patient. As I step into the doorway of the consulting room, I witness- yet again and in plain view another supposed patient carousing with the receptionist at her desk.

"Morwenna, can I see you! Now!"

"Of course, Doc."

"Shut the door please," I watch her visually stiffen at this directive.

"It is entirely unprofessional of you that every time I open the consulting room door, you're found to be entertaining your friends who've come for a chat and socialising with you at your desk!"

"No way, Doc! If you think any of them are my friends or that I'm doing anythin' to encourage that bunch, you couldn't be more wrong!"

"Then why does there seem to be a steady stream of fishermen and fisherboys- er, boys or whatever they are- constantly fawning over you when you're meant to be working! Hmm?"

"Him? As if! You can't be serious Doc if you imagine that there's a fisherman in this village that I might possibly be interested in."

"Then perhaps you can tell me why you insist on wearing those absurd fishing lures dangling from your ears? _Hmm?_"

"I'm not kiddin', Doc. This next patient's been a total mither from the moment he walked in!" she holds her mouth agape in a convincingly exaggerated state of incredulity. "I'm only doing my job and trying to stay busy and this one's all over me acting all smarmy-like."

In the span of a deep ephemeral breath, my long exasperating experience with surgery receptionists percolates back into consciousness. Not a one has ever, not once, admitted to a single bloody mistake they've ever been confronted with. Instead they come right back at you with a complaint and a complete denial of any responsibility whatsoever. They never, and for that matter not a single specimen of lemmings that comprise this village, ever does anything I say! Would it be so bloody hard? Here I am the learned professional, the (previously) accomplished surgeon, the (at one-time) top of my field, and esteemed (once, elsewhere- far from here) medical professional- and yet as far as this bloody-minded village is concerned I might as well gut fish morning, noon, and night!

"Ahh..."

Well, I'm far too busy to deal with the mind-numbing effects of my receptionists' ego especially when they are, like Morwenna clearly in this instance, insist on withholding exculpatory information from a perfectly good hypothesis. It is precisely these situations that I've found best to handle in an entirely constructive and dignified manner: by changing the subject.

"Morwenna, on the hypothesis that were you to have more responsibilities it would help you avoid vexation by the patients, I have another task- something new, for you to do. We can discuss all the details later, but for the most part you can begin straightaway."

"Yeah?" she responds promisingly.

"We will be transferring all our patient records into digital format on the computer. There'll be a new system for the practice that works with my new mobile. It promises to be better than the old tosh system we had here at one time before we went back to solidly reliable paper records." I hand over to her the heavy bulging instruction manual that has been supplied to me, "This is the documentation from the PCT. I'd like you to read it through it and take charge of the changeover."

"Okay. Yeah, Doc. Good, I can do this," she assures me along with the emphasis of her 'fishing lures' bobbing up and down approvingly in tandem with her head.

"We can discuss its full implementation next week."

"Great! Thanks, Doc."

"...and let's have that next patient."

"Gladly. But I gotta warn ya Doc, this one thinks he's Captain Jack or somethin'. He keeps telling me, 'Ooo- I'm such a sight for sore eyes'. Be careful he doesn't try somethin' with you, eh?"

She hastens back to her desk before I can beseech what she could possibly mean by that statement when she bellows, "Mr. Finch! The Doctor will see you- now!"

"Hello there, Doctor," my patient ambles in and approaches me until he's uncomfortably close peering intently at me from hugely swollen and inflamed eyes and quips, "Boy, are you a sight for sore eyes!"

"Er, right. Have a seat Mr.- Bird."

"You are aware," I preface my examination waiting for his particularly insipid grin to abate, "that you likely have 'fisherman's conjunctivitis'?"

"Yeah, I know. _'Tit juice conjunctivitis'_**†††**_,_ that's what we at sea call it... Oh, oh, Doc, I can see that that's really pricked up your ears now, eh? Can't get your mind off the ladies can you- you rakish devil, you!"

"No," I say whilst resisting the contraction of the levator labii superioris muscle of my upper lip and sneering out loud: 'Bloody brilliant, Port Wenn's very own codding cod fisherman.'

"You know, you could easily prevent this if you'd thoroughly wash your eyes with clean water immediately after being squirted when the nets are pulled in. Better yet, simply wear eye protection and you could continue working without having to make for port," I harrumphed my standard pronouncement for the prevention of this common enough affliction.

"Can't do that, Doc. Still got me hands full once the nets are pulled in and well, any eye wear just gets wet and gets in the way, don' they? And besides, I much prefer me a good ale," he batted his eyelids repeatedly over the thin remaining slots before his swollen eyes.

"I'll prescribe you eye drops for the pain," I lean in to examine his lower eyelids more closely now and take note of his odd asymbolia‡. "You are experiencing pain, aren't you?"

"Hurts like hell," he says without so much as a flinch and immediately renews the same stupid grin. "Hurts even worse with the light shining in 'em. But there's never any use whinging about it- that's what I always say. Hey Doc, you got any idea'r what a fish with _no_ eyes is called?"

"I'll write you a prescription for..."

"_Fsh!_" he sputters sibilantly.

"...tetracycline drops. Is there anything else?"

"Oh, yeah, yeah. I'll surely will be needin' me 'nother appointment for a gawd-awful, excrutiatin' sharp pain."

"What for?"

"Here," he winces sharply and indicates the whole left side of his face. "Terrible pain on me face, all 'round where it's bright red and all, and puffy-like too."

"Hmm... I don't see anything there."

"Oh, no. Not yet! But if I play me cards right, that's where your lovely lit'le receptionist will be slapping me face!" and follows with a simpering, "Savvy?"

Oh gawd, another inbred inhabitant of Port Wenn clearly off his onion! And to think, here I've managed to hold my tongue and remain civil to the whole bloody lot of them. Here, for all my efforts, I have to suffer these fools on a daily basis but does that ever mean they'll listen to me or do what I tell them? Absolutely not. What the bloody-hell are they waiting for- for me to say nice things to them?!

**8/5/12 to be continued...**

* * *

†Harvey, William: On The Motion Of The Heart And Blood, 1628

††**fish erysipiloid-** a bacterial infection also known as 'fish poisoning' that enters wounds caused by the bones or fins of fish during handling causing inflammation and discoloration that spreads rapidly.

†††**fisherman's conjunctivitis (Tit juice conjunctivitis)-** an acute inflammation of the thin lining membrane over the eyes due to contact with the juice of marine growths known as 'duffs' or 'tits'. When trawled to the surface they may burst in the cod end of the net and the juice may be squirted into the eyes of the fisherman. The juice contains strong irritants of silicon particles causing redness and inflammation and eventual blistering.

‡**pain asymbolia-** the inability to recognize the unpleasant or disagreeable component of a painful or threatening stimulus, also known as pain dissociation.


	5. Chapter 5: Petits Soins

**Chapter 5: Petits Soins**

A CASE OF GOUT, ONE CASE OF PILES, two of diarrhea, three cases of respiratory distress, another three cases of lumbago, an assortment of neglected and infected cuts and abrasions, a rash of, well- rashes, and a dire case of paraphimosis later and I've dispatched my last patient of the morning. Well, _dispatched_ may be no more than fanciful thinking on my part. I was however relieved to send away one particular whinging time-waster with a fresh plaster on her scratch after listening to her lurid tale attributing it to having been viciously attacked by a pack of rabid hedgehogs†.

This morning's activity may constitute a particularly busy day for many a GP, but as I'm not about to be cozened by the sleepy bucolic setting, I recognise it as a fairly standard day for Port Wenn. Soon enough now I will favour myself with a highly nutritious lunch in seclusion at the kitchen table with my new mobile and the opportunity to prepare its special software. But before taking sustenance, I'll allay myself with a brisk walk to secure my special plans for tomorrow evening.

"Morwenna, I'm popping out for ten minutes. I'll return before lunch."

"Doc, quick! Name that patient!" she exclaims to me as she abruptly swivels her computer's screen to face me.

"That's Mr. Sallingsworth's fractured patella," the radiological image she displays belonged to the bladdered arse who'd overly imbibed and fallen from a rooftop after his overtures were rebuffed by an apparently quite fetching seagull.

After a few more clacks on her keyboard she calls out to me again, "...and this one? C'mon Doc!"

"Mr. Hart's sprained carpus with fractured carpal bones in three places," the x-ray chart clearly indicates where his fist had missed the face of his so-called mate, Mister What's-it, and instead squarely struck the door whilst they brawled over the affections of some clearly deluded female.

"...and this?!" she fires this demand at me after still more keystrokes.

"Mrs. Tescher's lacerated hand- before the twelve stitches it took to mend it," I describe the photo shown as part of PC Penhale's investigation depicting the mad woman's wound from having cut herself in the course of hurling dishes in commemoration of her negligent husband on their tenth wedding anniversary.

"Gosh Doc, you got every name. Spot on too," Morwenna sat there looking at me, beaming like the cat who'd swallowed the canary.

"Brilliant, innit?" she persisted, "See how the new digital records provide for a place there for the patient's picture?"

"_And..._?" I could only beg the question since she'd clearly gone blinkered. She had yet to show me any patient photographs: after all I could hardly care what my patients looked like; I didn't treat them because of, or more accurately- in spite of, what they looked like.

"But I didn't do _that_, since you're, well, you know- you! Instead I placed there a picture of their injury or ailment or their medical issue or whatever you'd remember. I figured we can just take a snap of the other patient's complaint who come to see you and save it for our records. Exceptin' where there'd normally be a picture of the patient's face for identification, you know as if they were _a person_ or somethin', I figured you'd know 'em from their medical context."

"Ah," I say with further cogitation. "That's very... well, it's a... ah, I'd have to say... that's- nominal, ahem"

"Really, Doc! Wow! You're not just saying that? Gosh that's- that's great! Really wonderful!" she enthuses making me fearful that I may have stirred up so much elation and self-satisfaction that she may feel compelled to bound across the desk and attempt to hug me.

"I'll be back before you take lunch," I nod apprehensively and back slowly towards the surgery door with some faint hope that her 'being stretched', as Pauline was insufferably fond of saying, will spare me yet another insufferable receptionist.

"Oh! I could print patient name tags with just the pictures... Ya know, hold on- even better, I'll make up flashcards, yeah!. No, wait- I've got it! Even better..." her last effusive words are gratefully lost as the door closes behind me.

.***

"Oh, gawd," I mutter to myself as I take the last steps down into the Large Restaurant, far too late to back away unnoticed.

"Martin!"

"Aunt Ruth... Mrs. Tishell," is my grudging greeting to the pair enjoying a companionable cuppa together.

"Doctor Ellingham, what a coincidence! We were just discussing you," this couldn't be good. "We couldn't agree on whether to convene the next 'Martin Ellingham' fan club meeting at the village hall or at the recreation centre?"

"Sally, the poor man can only grace so many command performances before his countless adoring worshippers," Ruth wryly adds as a taut smile stretches across her face.

"You are so right, Ruth. We must relent to only the largest of spaces, not just to try to accommodate all the assembled throngs mind you, but we must consider his hugely bloated head and that massive ego of his that would otherwise be constantly crashing into the rafters," they then turn to look at one another before succumbing to a savage paroxysm of giggles.

These two old birds formed their unlikely friendship in recent weeks founded surely upon the common bond (or so it seems) of my utter bedevilment. How on earth this turnabout has come to be since Mrs. Tishell's breakdown when she'd taken James Henry intent to lure me to her self-deluded romantic rendezvous at the Castle, I can scarcely fathom. But soon enough afterwards they were laughing together uproariously like schoolgirls at the idea that a woman could ever, acting of her own volition, be so completely gobsmacked infatuated with the likes of me to be anything but pure utter nonsense. My dear Aunt Ruth takes delight in arguing for her newfound friend that the poor woman had merely suffered an unfavourable drug interaction- not gone absolutely barking! Ruth has even come to deride my contentions that Mrs. Tishell was long consumed by thoughts and fantasies about me instead as an indication of _my _psychological cry for help!

Nowadays the two of them can be overheard all around the village prattling on about _my_ obsessive delusions as a Lothario with irresistible charms who fancies himself as driving the female populace of greater Cornwall mad with desire! My trained-psychiatrist aunt and our local chemist charge that I imagine _myself_ to be a dangerously addictive drug to women- an irresistible drug of desire! The latest gossip they've propagated is that I contrived the entire incident in order to incite green-eyed jealousy in Louisa so as to entrance her back under my Rasputin-like 'spell'. Ruth has taken to asking me drolly whether she might have a professional obligation to perhaps initiate some sort of intervention on Louisa's behalf!

Of course I concede that Mrs. Tishell's general behaviour has improved markedly since Aunt Ruth helped put a stop to her alarming self-prescription and started her on a proper course of treatment for social anxiety. Louisa also recognises the dramatic change but maintains that it serves to further extenuate Mrs. Tishell's mistake of mixing such powerful and interactional drugs in the first place. If only I had retained some evidence to prove the depraved and disturbing 'shrine' I'd discovered that Mrs. Tishell had erected to me- at least I think that's what I remember it might have been. All of which they find hilariously funny since it's dismissed as proof I am completely bodmin from projecting my own sensational fantasies. Even Louisa questions whether I might possibly be exaggerating the whole affair and begins looking very worried that it could belie _my own _extremely troubling fixation!

"Are you not spending lunch with James Henry today, Martin?"

"Ah no, I've come to speak to Al, actually," I motion over to Al as he busies himself with preparations for an imaginary rush of customers where I am glad to sidle and escape this pair's cruel confederation.

"Hello again Doc- a table for lunch?"

"Umm... no, but I'd like to have one for tomorrow evening, please," I ask without allusion to the otherwise empty eatery. "For two."

"Very good then. Two for you and Miss Glasson."

"Ah," I lower my voice further, "Could we have the quiet table there by the railing, please."

"No problem, Doc- for you our most romantic table, and I'd 'ave gladly taken your reservation earlier as I was visitin' your surgery."

"Ah, but you were a patient then," Al was one of the few in this impertinent village who didn't habitually harass me on the street for medical advice on-demand outside of surgery hours and I was intent on honouring that mutual professional consideration.

"What time then?"

"Six o'clock."

"Right. Well, we've kept the usual favourites, so six o'clock it is."

"Meaning-," I observe Al's growing unease as I cock my head to ask, "the menu's changed again?"

"Well," Al tugs slightly at his shirt collar before continuing, "Dad's banished me from the kitchen today while he's workin' on his secret new culinary creation, but- but, he's already assured me that our favourites, your favourites and Miss Glasson's favourites are definitely still available."

"I see. Thank you Al," I remark as I turn to leave musing on how Bert's pear-shaped business ventures tended to follow his own.

"Ooh, did I hear you mention 'romantic', Doctor Ellingham? Hmm, while the cat's away, eh? Don't worry though, Miss Glasson won't find out about it from us- it'll just be our little secret," Mrs. Tishell smirks. "You are quite the irasibile, or is that risible, rascal aren't you Doctor?"

"Mrs. Tishell, Aunt Ruth," I sternly bid them my leave.

"Oh Martin, something serious before you go," Ruth turns to me sharply; no doubt to proffer me some parting torment. "I'm being asked to pay a visit to Broadmoor next week and was hoping you might come along so the two of us might collaborate on a new patient?"

"Oh?" I respond expectantly whilst in the background Mrs. Tishell becomes increasingly animated.

"Yes, Martin," she continues oblivious to the growing spectacle of Mrs. Tishell behind her clasping and caressing a spoon in a lurid display of lascivious kisses and licks with furtive gestures of my ravenous consumption.

"There's a new patient there whose veracity as criminally insane has been called into question and I'm being asked to consult," she continues undeterred by my increasingly dropping jaw at the sight playing out at her back. "I'm thinking what better diagnostic indicator could there possibly be than to test whether the patient were to spontaneously fall in love with _you_ and..."

"Goodbye," I turn instantly on my heels to leave, only too eager to leave them behind as they erupt into ruthless snickering.

**8/11/12 to be continued...**

**(edited 8/12/12)**

* * *

†**rabid hedgehogs-** hedgehogs do not carry rabies (the deadliest disease in the world), and there has only ever been a single confirmed case (one) worldwide of a hedgehog dying from it. Hedgehogs do display an unusual behavior called '_anting_' or '_anointing_' they engage in when first encountering a new or interesting object or food. They will lick the substance repeatedly until a frothy saliva forms in its mouth and then rub the excess saliva and froth onto its skin and spines to make themselves less palatable to predators.


	6. Chapter 6: Assiduit

**Part II**

**Chapter 6: Assiduit**

WITH MUCH RELIEF, I RETURN TO THE SANCTUM that is my surgery and ensconce myself at the kitchen table before a nutritionally balanced lunch and set about the task of preparing my new smartphone's special app. For any task as important as this, thoughtful and meticulous preparation is always essential. Good preparation is essential to all worthy endeavours and that, one day, will make for an invaluable lesson to our little James Henry: proper preparation, it is the foundation to all success.

Experience has taught me the value of proper preparation ranging from tasks in operating theatre plumbing-in common endovascular stents to everyday tasks of plumbing-in basic household appliances... Er... well, that may not actually be the best example considering my one-time experience with my brand new dishwasher (turning to look askance at where it once disastrously sat). Its utterly dreadful directions and confused diagrams bear blame for a faulty connection during installation that caused some minor illness amongst various patients. Yet thanks to my indefatigable patience I was able to make a careful diagnosis and devise a course of treatment to avert a much wider and more serious health hazard. All by virtue of patience. Yes, patience- proper patience that is, it is the foundation to all success.

"Right, then," I place my smartphone at an ergonomically optimal position propped up before me. I plug in its umbilical cable and connect its other end into the adjacent laptop. At the ready as well is the vital hands-free accessory awaiting its connection. A quick check confirms a full charge on the smartphone's battery and no dire blinking lights requiring appeasement. Available here too- just in case, are pages and links to helpful if not otherwise innocuous instructions. And finally, of course, the bowl of healthy vegetable soup I've made for myself. Next, is to locate one last time the software app we're after. Hmm, right:

_CyraKnow™_

_CyraKnow™__is an intelligent personal romance navigator app that uses a spoken natural language interface for personalized romantic interaction..._

"Ah, yes..." there we have it. With everything suitably prepared, we can proceed with its transfer:

_Step 1: Download_

And choose the button there. Okay. Mmm, right:

_Connecting..._

And now- no doubt, we wait:

_Downloading..._

I take a few more spoonfuls of soup and consider again something I've pondered over quite a bit lately: a statement that Louisa had made to me long ago of her efforts to 'connect with me'. She asserted at the time that my consistent response to her efforts was to always 'just close down'. It's quite possible that I actually had no idea what she was saying to me because I had already dismissed it as nothing but irrational, emotional, and hormonal blather. Or perhaps it was because what followed might be construed as criticism of my professional disposition, and consequently ended with an established conclusion to all our rows- in this instance at least, as _she_ stood dumbstruck watching helplessly as _I_ stormed away angrily.

What Louisa had tried to convey to me, thinking back, was in regards to something she'd managed to learn about herself. This self-awareness of hers was how 'she would start doubting herself' as a result of her intent to 'connect with me'. Huh- imagine! Had I understood that statement then; had I puzzled it out since; had I even considered it as anything but an attack directed at me- then much unpleasantness might have been avoided. Instead its worst implications were only manifest once Louisa was an exhausted, unprepared, alienated, and flummoxed new mum. By then her vulnerabilities were exposed and all her latent insecurities aroused for the surprise appearance by none other than her very own horrible, troublesome, selfish, manipulative...

_Download finished_

Ah, transference complete; that was fast. I suspect that Port Wenn has its long-promised internet upgrade to thank. This improvement of late is likely to be lost on the half of the locals who don't spend every waking moment surfing the web. Like a Bert Large 'Spécialité de la Moron' the remaining half would fancy it as a cause to eat, drink, and carry on celebrating legends of the 'inter_net_' having saved the benighted village from starvation by catching mythical 'inter_fish_' to be deep-fried and served alongside ghastly 'inter_chips_' or some such insalubrious course†. Best leave it to the gullible morons to lap up such tales whilst I enjoy this wholesome low-sodium soup. On to the next step:

_Step 2: Installation_

_CyraKnow™_ _will now install the downloaded app to run on your device. During this process, it will configure itself to operate with your device's capabilities together with your compatible Bluetooth® headset (combined earphone and microphone) to provide voice recognition input and synthesized voice output cues for concealed use throughout the romantic interaction._

_Please turn on your Bluetooth® headset now to be recognized and activated before proceeding..._

"Right," I reach for the headset purchased with the mobile, er- smartphone, and press its power button to activate it, and:

_Installing..._

"Ah, now we've made it happy," I announce to no one at all with a tinge of self-satisfaction. Proof that with a healthy dose of patience (or was it preparation?), I _can_ indeed learn to master even these smartphone gadgets.

"Hmm... 'Yes, I could'," I say again as I once did in response to Louisa's inducement, 'You _could learn_?'. 'I could' learn and 'I can learn' and I have learned to _connect_- spontaneously even, to my inarticulate, incoherent, inchoate, wriggling, adorable, brilliant, and beautiful baby son. Then how much more can I learn for the woman who means everything to me? From that first moment I set eyes on Louisa I've longed to tell her how I feel, what I feel, if only I had the chance. If only I could tell her how she makes me feel, given just that one chance... 'One last chance'- wasn't that precisely what I'd pleaded for back at the Castle? If this is my last chance then what else am I waiting for, if not...

_Ready_

"Umm... ah- yes":

_Step 3: Enter Profiles_

_Before you can use CyraKnow™__ you must enter basic information that establishes your beloved's profile and your own personal profile for subsequent use in its romance algorithms. CyraKnow™__ will thereafter prompt you for further input of descriptions, traits, and preferences that personalize and optimize your romantic interactions during use._

"Okay, 'basic information' then- right. Good":

_Beloved's Name:__

"L-o-u-i-s-a," I type unhesitatingly before reading it back to myself aloud. "Louisa."

Her name alone is a soothing aesculapian†† balm of the tenderness, kindness, sweetness, and warmheartedness that she embodies- she is above all passionate, optimistic, and ever cheerful. Louisa is... that is- she is very... so very, very _sanguineness._ That is unless she is insisting upon being outspoken or obstinate or headstrong, or at times, merely exasperatingly bloody-minded. Perhaps these very qualities derive from her name that means 'famous warrior'. Heaven knows too well what a tremendous warrior she can be too: an unfaltering champion to even the dimmest of her students and to each of her considerably inconsiderate colleagues; a mighty paladin to even the most unworthiest of friends; and a fierce advocate to every last pathetically ungrateful villager. All the more reason to be thankful we are always together on the same side, Louisa and I- in league, as comrades, allies- or at least as noncombatants. Well, perhaps not _always_.

I suppose there has been an exception or two. Although that fault invariably belongs to one certifiable arse or another who has assailed me with an incontrovertibly 'bad day'. I can't help but recall one particularly bad day that arose due to a consummately pompous arse by the name of Adrian Pitts. The worst part was days later when that resultant mood coincided with Louisa having donned her warrior mantle on behalf of young Peter Cronk. Had it not been for another incitement by Euripides††† in the clash that followed, we might have sorted ourselves straightaway without crossing swords, and then my proper attention to Peter would have prevented his condition from becoming quite so urgent.

Only because Louisa's fiercely protective caring nature had been there to champion Peter did his outcome turn out to be a happy one. Whilst the medical care I provided did contribute to that outcome, I did owe a great debt of professional gratitude to the same Pitts, my former bloody pupil, for operating on Peter when I could not. That gratitude was dispensed in spite of learning that it had been him behind my new-found torment (and a good many more bad days) regarding my blood issue not long after my fresh start in Port Wenn. Curiously, I learned later from Chris Parsons that Pitts had not long thereafter faced disciplinary action at hospital for a sordid history of sexual harassment. It seems the pig had had a number of registrars and staff intimidated and bullied for so long until they'd suddenly found the courage to stand up to him and his vaunted position.

I tend to believe that an isolated schoolboy, like young Peter for instance, is more than a little fortunate to have Louisa as his very own champion for strength and courage. But my thoughts and hopes these days are really devoted to another boy entirely, that is our little boy- our son, and how fortunate he is to have this very special warrior as his mother and protector. She is, and will forever be, his '_warrior famoused for fight'_‡: a true chivalrous champion in times of hardships and struggles; his devoted defender against doubt and apprehension; his valiant hero when facing rejection or isolation; his bastion of comfort if ever menaced by merciless schoolmates or fraudulent friends. He will always feel safe, protected, and forever truly loved.

That's how I know, that nothing else matters. Only that she be at my side- not whether we are always on the same side (even if she's being exasperatingly bloody-minded). Louisa, because of her, nothing else matters; nothing in this utterly unpredictable and impermanent world. Louisa is and means everything to me and to James Henry. It is for me- what I realise, the Bard himself could only hope to express with:

Then happy I, that love and am beloved,

Where I may not remove nor be removed.‡

"Louisa..." Ah... umm... best crack on now before lunch gets cold.

_Beloved's Occupation:___._

"Er- umm... Right." I suppose that I could have refrained from making the occasional disparaging remark regarding Louisa's job- er, occupation. Yet my sheepish gulp fails to make clear to me how she can bear to surround herself with those little two-legged-petri-dishes day-in and day-out who regard rational thought and behaviour as but one more chore to be avoided? Couldn't they just be _docile_, reserved, and attentive little children like they're supposed to be so they might one day actually aspire to something beyond face-painting or colouring within the lines? I know I did.

I, of course, had teachers throughout my life by which to learn from too. However, I was taught steeped in a regimen of pedagogical discourse cited as the _Sarcastic_ method. Painfully _patronizing_ lessons, intended to years later bolster me for the high-pressure environment of the operating theatre. Why if one falls to pieces by being berated or belittled, then what future is there for a surgeon who might fall to pieces when one's knowledge and abilities are called upon to save a life? I was made aware that no amount of mollycoddling would have ever prepared me otherwise to aspire to be a physician and surgeon. For all these early lessons, I learned them long before medical school at St. Thomas's, and before even boarding school by my very first teachers- my parents.

Even at school I found many similar-minded teachers who'd rather I dealt with my persecution by schoolmates on my own. If I didn't put myself on my teachers' bad side by asking too many questions, I surely did with my 'pedantic' answers that managed to do the same. Sooner or later, every one of them told me to desist with snivelling and conform in deference to that most venerated awful teacher of all: tradition. Yet I did once proudly bear the designation of 'teacher' myself in the instruction of surgical practice to medical students, and despite being conflicted, I successfully taught these adult students one basic lesson: to always make themselves worthy of their solemn duty to save lives and to protect the health and well-being of their patients.

I can say now unequivocally that my experiences could not be further removed from Louisa's toward her pupils and their education. I also know full well that Port Wenn Primary has nothing in common to the frightful boarding school I attended as a schoolboy and that Louisa's pedagogical techniques for her young students could never be mistaken from those which I was familiar as a child.

Nonetheless at school I eagerly poured myself into books and learning. I could not be more willing to mercifully shunt diversions as I wholeheartedly craved to understand the things and people around me, both at school and at home. In fact, Louisa tells me just how precious were my accomplishments and she is always quick to extol just how extraordinary is what I learned and how well I learned it.

"Martin, you learned so extraordinarily well at such an extraordinarily young age already- more so than the rest of us think possible for ourselves," Louisa has said to me. "But what most children need first and foremost, is what I count as my most important _job-_ that is teaching each and every one of our students _to learn how to learn_."

I, er- well, didn't totally follow what those ambitious words really meant- at first. Nor did I fully grasp what she had once meant by 'with proper encouragement', students with the ability to learn in one area, can then 'cross-over to learn in others'. Nonetheless her words grow more elucidative with every passing day. That happens when I watch her, typically quite unnoticed, and how she teaches one special pupil in particular- our little James Henry. In his tiny grasp she waggles his hands and arms and coos her encouragement to his strengthening muscles. She lovingly braces his insubstantial musculoskeletal frame, tenderly giving assurances, as he's not quite ready to sit upright. Or she gently strokes his soft skin and wisps of hair, stimulating his developing peripheral nervous system. I can see clearly now what he is learning and _how_ he is learning it- and I am _certain_ that it is far more valuable than the seemingly useful lessons of anatomy and physiology.

"Occupation," I now can answer with full reverence, "Head Teacher."

_Beloved's Eye Colour:___._

"'Eye colour'. Hmm... " Louisa's eyes are so very- ah, umm... so, then is this to be about Louisa or merely about her features? How can it really matter how I define her physical attributes? How on earth can physiognomy possibly prescribe my feelings for Louisa? Just because the things I say come out as complete rubbish, is every beautiful thing about her to be reduced to merely a description of her appearance? For goodness sake! The clumsy ineptness of _my_ words may be one thing, but the ineptitude of words themselves are quite another.

It's not acute romantic-aphasia that restrains me from sounding like that unctuously superficial smooth-tongued Danny Steele. Nor is it alexithymia‡‡ that inhibits the same insincere smarmy speech that my own execrably egotistical father so effortlessly evokes. If the same horrid, narcissistic, self-centred empty conceits spewed from my mouth, would I ever dream to be mistaken for charming as well? Never! Would I ever tell Louisa all what she means to me embellished with charming adjectives and suavely spoken adverbs? Never! I would rather speak at length on the physiology of _hearts_ and the taxonomy of _flowers_ than one word of phoney hearts and flowers!

"Louisa..." I invoke her name until the twitching of my fingers relaxes and my disturbed breathing recedes.

What had Louisa said when we were at the Castle? What all has she waited for and for so long? Wasn't it that she had simply wanted to hear me 'say nice things'? Yes, that's it- she wants to hear me 'say nice things'. I do _want_ to 'say nice things' to her. I want to learn to 'say nice things' to Louisa.

But just their colour then? There is so much more to even Louisa's eyes than just their colour. Looking into them their colour is that of the untamed sea lashing against the rugged north Cornish coast and transformed by depth, reflection, and impulsive mood so that in one moment it's a vibrant bluish-green and in the next a resplendent greenish-blue and in yet another a swirl of both, ringed in an amber hue- as if all the coastlines in the world could hope to be contained in their depths. That profusion of colour is more a state of being than just a colour. This colour, in the old language, would be known as _glas_‡‡‡. _Glas_, a fitting appellation for this Louisa Glasson whose glistening eyes first caught my notice. But in today's more familiar language that colour- I suppose, would be called simply '_hazel_'. Yes, that's it. I tap in the letters for precisely that description: 'hazel'.

I tap at the 'Next' button with an incipient sense of boldness:

_Beloved's Hair Colour:___._

"Hair colour?" Ah... the colour? Just the colour? Shouldn't it be asking for a description of that lustrous-lusty nimbus that adorns her perfect visage? What of its hypnotic sway that induces a light-headedness that stupefies me of words and reason, to say nothing of its rhythmic motion that composes the iambic prosody of my heart? Why not just then settle on a description of its tantalising temperaments, its giddying fragrance, its frisson-hastening silkiness?

Instead I mull over that more than a full day has passed since I've seen her and yet another still to go before I will see her again. She'll be taking her lunch now too, I expect. If she was at school right now in Port Wenn, instead of at her conference, I could be there in thirty seconds to find her alone and feign to consult with her about some student's chronic condition that I'm not happy with. Rather she's adjourned in London and surrounded by old associates and new acquaintances with her perfect face revealed by that beautiful hair pulled back in a lively ponytail dancing about her. Her ponytail will sidle back and forth with every flexure of her irresistible smile. Like dance partners one leading as the other follows, her smile turns up broadly, and builds momentum to be released by her hair swinging unabashedly; the partners exchange and her lovely mane lashes to and fro impelling yet another smile to beam across her cheeks.

Louisa's hair spills with ardour over her beautiful face with a smile that radiates alacrity that she shares generously with all in her presence. But for me- just for me, it means to be embraced therein, amid that beautifully long flowing hair, where there exists a place of utter contentment by which to lose myself and forgo phantoms of control and the ruin of its resistance: amongst those dark strands is refuge far, far from the world and its ceaseless intrusions. The touch and feel of it splashing over me, the sheer feel of it upon my touch, through my fingers and flowing against my face to quench and wash away every anguish and mortification like standing under the coolest most-refreshing cataract of clearest pure water.

All this indulgence in reverie of Louisa risks a return to the anaesthetizing effects of contemplation and paralysis to my limbs and lips alike. Far better to focus simply on her hair's elementary colour which, I'd best describe as 'Chestnut'. Ah- yes, that's it.

_Beloved's Skin Colour:___._

"Hmm... right- her skin," I read the prompt out loud.

I close my eyes and indulge myself with visions of Louisa's soft diaphanous skin that begins so alluringly there upon her cheek... Oh, that I might touch that cheek! and trace the silky softness of its contours across her delicate zygomaticus muscles and linger at her dizzyingly lovely auricles before they lead me to glide along the luxuriant skin enshrouding her sternocleidomastoid muscles; so prominent when her eyes look up longingly into mine. Then downwards I'm guided to be engulfed by the exquisite pool of skin about her neck and shoulders where the sweep of her subclavius meet together enviously there at her suprasternal notch where I might lavish my attentions with caresses before I'm lead further down the slow, sensual descent to explore the sweetly intoxicating skin of every part of her nether regions...

"Ah, skin colour then. Right," a quavering voice not quite my own, returns from reverie as my eyes snap open and with a gasp I hope to reclaim a modicum of discipline to focus dispassionately upon a palette of colours.

"'Blanched Almonds,' I say with a nod. "The milky-smooth colour and texture of blanched almonds," the words barely clear my throat as my unsteady hand taps in the letters until ever-so slowly normal respiration resumes.

_Your Name:___._

At last, a response that requires no deliberation, "'Martin'- next question."

**11/25/12 to be continued...**

* * *

†The village of Mousehole in south Cornwall annually celebrates Tom Bawcock's Eve with a parade and servings of Star-gazey pie, a fish pie comprised of whole cresting pilchards, to commemorate his braving of storm-ravaged seas to single-handedly catch enough fish to save the entire village from starvation. However, rumour has it that the 'legend' is actually a fairly recent appropriation of an ancient festival by an impishly enterprising restaurateur (go figure).

††**aesculapian**- related to the healing art of medicine originating from the Greek god Aesculapius and medicine's iconic snake-entwined staff.

†††**Euripides**- ancient Greek tragedian for whom is dubiously attributed the quotation, "Those whom the gods wish to destroy they first make mad."

‡Shakespeare, William: Sonnet XXV, 1609

‡‡**alexithymia**- characteristic difficulty identifying feelings and distinguishing between feelings and the bodily sensations of emotional arousal in oneself and their expression and response with other people.

‡‡‡**glas-** in Cornish and other Brythonic languages, the word for the semantic name of the colour photometrically ranging from green to blue (no separate original words exist to distinguish them).


	7. Chapter 7: Probité

**Chapter 7: Probité**

"HMM... HAVEN'T I ALREADY ANSWERED THAT QUESTION?", I mutter into the smartphone screen gawping back at me:

_Your Sex: _❏ _M _❏ _F_

Ah- well, perhaps not. 'Male' then to Louisa's 'Female'. No need for any of those ridiculous clichés contrasting men and women and the trite chasm that separates them. None of that 'anima and animus' or 'Mars**†** and Venus' tosh here, I should hope. I for one am keen on the differences. Mmm...although Louisa is a perfect Venus, and I am... _a perfect idiot_ for not acknowledging it sooner. But not just 'Male' now- I am a father too, of all things. A father? Still not quite sunk in, that. Scant months have passed, weeks really, and it's all still quite a bit to take in. Of course that's not counting the time when Louisa was rather expectant and I was unwittingly, to say the least, _not_. Then again, she was already six months gravid at my backdoor then, and I could hardly be expected to know what it was I was _supposed_ to be.

Dreadful as the concept still seems to me, it wasn't until we'd talked- actually talked, that first time shortly after we'd walked away from the Castle- the three of us together that I started to understand. Assured at last that the baby was safe, good in fact, and nearly right away comfortably asleep in his babyseat in the back of the car. And there for a time we just sat, looking out over the nearby cliff we'd just come away from and the horizon that lay beyond. We recognized then that in the small journey we'd just walked together hand-in-hand that to our right had been a treacherous precipice above an unpredictable sea and to our left had been an isolated and impenetrably stoney castle keep. Yet safe and untroubled we remained linked as one, along the path in between, the _middle way_**††**. We realized with growing awareness that just moments earlier all our doubts for the future, much like the redoubtable Castle walls themselves, had just been irrevocably breached and we would henceforth face them all together.

Louisa proceeded to tell me of how not long after the baby's birth, she'd begun to feel increasingly confused and hurt. That just prior she'd had to resign herself to having and raising our child entirely by herself, when that joyfully changed in an emotional instant with the baby's sudden birth. In that instant she had found herself believing, that for all the world by my being there, everything else had changed as well. By lovingly offered me our newborn son to hold for the first time, she had absolved me of all hesitation and reluctance with her sweet encouragement of, "But, you could learn?" My response of "Yes, I could" was to become a powerful prescription for her as she soon watched it come to pass with joyful astonishment and deepening pleasure.

I indeed could _learn_, and I did learn; at least as far as being a father to our son was concerned. From where Louisa was tentatively watching, my learning process seemed nearly effortless and almost natural. In the same way it appeared to her to be just as effortless, from what little I had ever dared reveal, that I'd ultimately overcome my blood issue and was intent to return to London as a surgeon. Yet for all I still had to learn as a father, it was evident to Louisa that James Henry was already becoming more important to me than that cherished career as a surgeon. Before too long it was within these happy realizations, that the seeds of Louisa's painful confusion and terrible hurt had begun to germinate.

She told me how the utter exhaustion of pregnancy, childbirth, nursing, and caring for our newborn at all hours had rapidly begun to take its toll, more so than she was prepared to admit; and more than any past experience had ever tested her ability to marshal her usual fortitude and determination. Then in her growing weakness and demoralization, as she described it, and before Louisa's mother had arrived to darken our doorstep, a most horrible feeling had begun to beset her. It felt to her as if she was jealous of her own precious and adored baby- only then to be wracked by devastating waves of guilt because of it.

Louisa had desperately believed that my oath of "I can learn", applied also to her- and to us. Yet if I could learn so effortlessly, then why had I still made no effort for _her_: to comfort her, to nurture her, to hold her, to _love_ her? By comparison she went on to relate to me that she'd always devoted herself to fostering and exhorting her students by being keenly aware of their daily struggles to learn and more than just the school material. She herself had struggled to grow up without a reliable mother or father to teach her and yet has pursued a lifetime of education without so much as family tradition or expectations to motivate her. By virtue of her continuous efforts and all the challenges to learn, Louisa became an accomplished and distinguished teacher; she rose to the top of her field as Headmistress, and became the universally admired and cherished mentor and inspirational leader she is today.

Louisa told me of the moment she began to lose a grasp on her hopes once the baby's name had ultimately been chosen. A moment that was, like too many others, one when I still couldn't manage to express my true motivations and instead presented it as yet another imperious action. In the wake of that moment her heartbreak seemed to come full circle when I'd curtly corrected her on the manner she was holding our newly anointed 'James Henry Ellingham'. She'd then at that moment felt the painful illusion of the earlier occasion when she'd lovingly offered me our new son to hold for the very first time.

"Martin, I love you- but not because you're an incurable romantic. I know you don't talk and I know you don't really share your feelings, and I know you don't suffer for emotional displays, but..." Louisa paused and squeezed my hands together firmly from across the car seat before looking intensely back into my eyes.

"I watched you struggle with your haemophobia for so long and every time a patient desperately needed you to staunch or stitch the flow of blood, I knew how wrenching it was for you. The more you struggled, the harder you endeavoured and the more that you endured, the more you demanded of yourself. All that time, I knew from your struggles that you would carry on for everything that was good and right and important, no matter what. And every time you did, I loved you all the more for it.

"You know I wish I could say this differently, but there may be no better way to help you understand: if feelings really could be construed as medical conditions, then why couldn't I find any _symptoms_ for _yours_?"

Until that moment, I did not know of the chasm that had kept us apart nor did I know how it had come to be. There is no chasm wider and deeper than the one between complete desire and its total fulfillment when separated by a hair's breath of misunderstanding.

"Hmph... Ah, umm...":

_Married: _❏ _Y _❏ _N_

Perhaps best to return to that question and topic at another time. I hastily tap the 'Next' button eager to press on:

_Response not recognized:_

_Married: _❏ _Y _❏ _N_

"Oh, Come on! Stupid... phone!" I gasp in annoyance. Why shouldn't a noncommittal 'grunt' suffice here as a response- it seems to work well enough with people?

How exactly should it even matter, to be married? Whether we're married or not, I know precisely how I feel about Louisa. If it's _proof_ that's required, I could always profess them via powerpoint presentation or even swear them before a sacrament of spreadsheets, _hmm_? There is nothing wrong with marriage as an institution per se, only the incompetents who insist in partaking in it! After all, one need not look any further than the pairings of any of Port Wenn's 960-odd residents. No wait, check that- look no further than the pairings of any of Port Wenn's 960-_extremely-odd_ residents.

Fortunately, with or without a wedding ring Louisa knows full well how much she means to me- I expect, probably- most likely. After all, not everyone is foolish enough to believe the ridiculous superstitions on claims of a _vena amoris_**†††**. What is far worse, is all the women who consider marriage to be some big bleeding project by which to change men. They seem to be under some delusional belief that the poor sod they've just married has taken his wedding vows upon a 'wedding _alter_'! Perhaps because they imagine men as hapless worm-like larvae that without them would crawl through life awaiting the day we should marry them so as to be metamorphosized into great dishy butterflies!

Well, I don't expect that I'll be mistaken for a chrysalis awaiting some inevitably grand transformation. Although Louisa does always, somehow, perceive there to be something more to me: in my essence perhaps, the real me even- my psyche**‡**, if you will. Hmm... good thing- that. How'd you suppose she has managed to do that? To divine the 'real _me_'; like 'a stick of rock, all the way through'- whatever that might be and however hard I've made it. Can't be too sure of that myself- although it's not as if anyone else has ever really bothered looking- until Louisa that is.

Louisa undoubtedly shares my views on matrimony and the purpose of change... or was that change and the purpose of matrimony? Hmm? Besides, once upon a time there had been a wedding and, well- it wasn't exactly the stuff of fairytales. Then again we did have plenty of 'help' that day from villagers and their propensity to talk rubbish. The things people say- what rubbish! It boggles the mind that I am reproached for _not_ talking, or being 'constipated' as Auntie Joan so earthily put it, when the real problem is what passes for 'talking' with most people is in reality gushing as if they're habituated to laxatives.

Of course I don't profess that I'm easy to talk to. I know I'm hard to talk to. I am actually aware of my own unawareness after all, as far as I can tell. I do wonder about it at times. However finding out that Louisa would ever have suggested that I'm a 'difficult person'- now _that_ was quite a revelation. A certain amount of introspection is, I suppose, necessary for change. On the other hand, I am no self-absorbed practitioner of omphaloskepsis or time-wasting devotee of childhood retrospective self-pity either.

Which is why a regular diet of red herring rich in antioxidants is so beneficial to the avoidance of such indulgences: like when I shared with Louisa my clinical observations of the incidence of mood disorders amongst isolated populations of women**‡‡** (nonetheless, inconclusively). Or when I conducted an impromptu brachioradialis reflex**‡‡‡** test to assess Louisa for neurological signs of delusional disorders (there were_ none_- strikingly so). Which reminds me: I have been remiss to point out to Louisa the importance of the returning muscle tone around her umbilicus and have neglected to critique her entire regimen of postpartum exercises for her transversus abdominis muscle as well.

"Oh...":

_Your Occupation:__

"Right," A simple enough query, I suppose. But is it physician or is it surgeon? What's it to be then: Doctor or Mister? I once knew precisely what I was and what I'd always expect to be- well _nearly_ always. But what exactly is it, that I _am_?

Not that my occupation should make any difference here at least- not in the matter of romance? Hmm, maybe for some. It definitely wouldn't make a difference to Louisa. Or would it? What if I were just a common fisherman? Mmm, maybe not; I would never have had the stomach for it- or anything else really involving a gawd-awful boat- er, ship. Ah, I can hear myself being mustered now by my father's voice, "No Martin, how many times have I told you, boats are but playthings for little boys who can't stop wetting themselves; ships are for real men."

That was deliberately meant to put me off of my ridiculous childish preoccupations and I suppose it worked- huh? It was all rather ridiculous, even embarrassing now to remember what all I'd taken a fancy to as a small boy. Still, I had collected a number of impressive specimens including the prize of a sacred _Panagæus cruxmajor_ and a number of _Inachis io_ I'd caught. Amongst the flora I'd tended was _Lavandula angustifolia_ or English lavender, having learned it was a rather good antiseptic for cuts and scrapes- and used in the War too. Likewise for the _Capsella bursa-pastoris_ that'd been used for injured soldiers and worked equally well on some of the fauna I'd looked after like an _Erinaceus europaeus_ that I'd nursed back to health like much of my growing menagerie- all before even my sixth birthday too. It was all a bit much though, surely too much. Probably should've learned my lesson well before I cared for that stupid, stupid...

"Ahem," my thoughts ebb just long enough for me to take note of the intense fasciculation of my fingers before more thoughts have a chance to gather and swell yet again.

Still, it had been a childish reaction then to naïvely believe that afterwards I could run away and stow aboard some storied ship bound for the fanciful native lands of the glorious Queen Alexandra's Birdwing, to traverse dangerously unexplored jungles for a _papilio bainor_- or venture the length and breadth of Asia for the fortune of a pair of rare Chinese Peacock butterflies. So, so many places and things I would've seen. All, no doubt, influenced by far too many boyhood tales secreted late at night under my covers, just as my parents suspected. It was indeed a silly immature dream of mine thinking to one day grow up and become a great wildlife explorer. I can still hear my father laughing at me when he'd found me and brought me home, "Wherever did you think you would go? Between your weak bladder and seasick stomach you couldn't discover anything beyond a lavatory! Huh, huh, ha..."

As part of my menagerie I'd cared for a small stray that I'd had to keep especially well hidden. It had depended upon my keeping it absolutely quiet as Mother had forbidden any more of my 'disgusting' preoccupations and had assured me that she was fed up with making excuses for me. All the more reason they'd been so angry with me, my parents. Once she discovered this latest charge of mine, as well as the full scope of my fascination, she ridded me of all of it. At six years old, it was decidedly high time for me to put away my childish things. But my little dog, quite unlike the rest, had been too stupid to go quietly though and the angry bite he'd given her was nonetheless the last time I ever saw him again- whereas in the end, I had to just go home. Everything- all of it, was binned. For good measure, my complicit nanny had been sent packing as well.

My father has been right about _one_ thing, I _am_ a surgeon. I _could_ fix people. I _did_ fix people. I was _good_ at it. Of course those weren't acceptable or right proper reasons for it- not for him anyway, although they did uphold the family name and honour (in some respects). But now I practice as a GP and my playthings are sphygmometers, plasters, and diarrhea medicine. I do however, get to be spewed upon with copious amounts of phlegm or vomit or other bodily discharge, but as of yet, no patient of mine has ever actually bitten _me_. Now I just care for the bodies of people who are clearly too bloody stupid to care for them themselves. How on earth do they imagine they could care for anyone or anything else- ever! How can I help them when they can't even care for themselves and care about their own health? Ah... "No Martin, you're forgetting rule number one. When it comes to caring: don't." Right.

"'Occupation', yes. S-u-r-g-e-o-n," I brazenly enunciate each letter as I type.

Now what? Is that amusing then? The little spinny-thing on the screen of my smartphone seems to mock the notion that I might ever actually call myself a surgeon again. Perhaps I should have typed in the more generic 'physician' or the archaic 'physic' or 'medic' or just conceded the vernacular 'doctor', or that truly loathsome alternative: 'doc':

_Occupation not recognized._

_Please explain 'surgeon': __

"Bloody Hell! Explain _surgeon_?! Every damn fool knows what a surgeon does?" Don't imbeciles playing at that ridiculously infantile game with the idiot patient's glowing nose shrieking the electronic equivalent of 'You Tosser! You Tosser!'- _they_ seem to know perfectly well what a _surgeon_ does! Does this brilliant software not even know that a surgeon...

"Bugger!" the sudden ringing of the surgery's telephone deserves a splenetic outburst.

Before but one more ring and with all due petulance I type hastily, "Cutting into people!"

"Surgery!" I bellow to the sorry intrusive sod calling me. "Wait- what emergency?... Calm down and tell me what is the emergency!... Is he breathing?... Is he conscious then?... Where?... Where- _exactly_? Keep a warm blanket over him- I'll be there in three minutes."

I grudgingly unplug my smartphone and slip it into the breast pocket of my suit and charge out the surgery with medical bag and defibrillator in hand.

**12/23/12 to be continued...**

* * *

**†Mars**- the ever popular fourth planet from the Sun, named for the even more popular third-supreme deity of ancient Rome and _god of war_, and entitled in the extremely popular book with that catchy title, as well as for the somewhat popular name "Martin" that means: _from the god Mars_.

**††middle way**- the central precept of Buddhism is that the path between the extremes of hedonistic indulgence in pleasure and the self-mortification of its denial is the one true path to wisdom where all others lead only to inevitable and relentless suffering.

**†††vena amoris**- literal Latin meaning for 'vein of love' that identifies the vein that originates in the fourth finger of the left hand and is directly connected to the heart. Its significance is the basis for the named 'ring finger' well known to traditionalists and jewelry salespersons everywhere- but not in truth to vascular surgeons. ["I could check it on the internet if you'd like"- DM].

**‡psyche-** in modern use the word means a person's "soul, spirit, and mind", but in ancient greek (prior to its association with Eros and later Cupid), as any experienced lepidopterist knows, it is simply the word for _butterfly_.

**‡‡**aka **McClintock Effect**

**‡‡‡brachioradialis reflex**- one of a series of deep tendon reflexes of the arm, forearm, wrist and phalanges that in healthy individuals will respond nearly instantaneously albeit involuntarily to specific stimuli (like a jerk).


	8. Chapter 8: Empressement

**Chapter 8: Empressement**

ANOTHER DERRING-DO SURFER went down just beyond the headland and is reported as unconscious but dubiously as breathing, and presently at the harbour having been floated there by his mates. As I hurtle down Roscarrock Hill to meet him with medical bag and defibrillator in hand, I can't help but wish Morwenna had returned early from lunch or, better still, that Mr. Surfer had had the common decency to be stupid during normal surgery hours. Perhaps someone might have informed him, along with the other recent spate of injured surfer-types requiring my services, that despite the recent unseasonably mild weather, peak surfing season was finished. I can't help but wish that their infestation had abandoned these environs for their hedonistic pursuits elsewhere.

Dead ahead of me is the usual horde of horrible girls who part just enough to form a gauntlet for me to pass through. My _levator labii superioris alaeque nasi_**†** muscle reflexively actuates even before the first unintelligible insult is hurled at me and persists long after their horrendous giggling fades in my wake.

"Outtatheway!" I roar breathlessly treading down the sand through a large cluster of onlookers to approach the surfboard bearing my patient.

"Move it!" this last expulsion of air provides me with a few milliseconds by which to assess the patient as well as to catch my breath.

"Hey, Doc!" my supposedly 'unconscious' patient chortles to me whilst seated comfortably atop a surfboard and regaling in the attentions of the assembled gawkers.

"I see that you couldn't be relied upon to remain immobilised. What happened?"

"I's biffed it on one totally sick ride when..."

"Wait- sick? Sick how?"

"No, da waves were sick," Mr. Surfer gawps at me matter-of-factly.

"What?! Did you or did you not strike your head?" I enjoin whilst grimacing at this antipodean practitioner of the Queen's English.

"No, everythin' jus' turned to jellie and next I know, I'm layin' here."

"You passed out?"

"Yeah, for a bit," to which I respond by switching on my already palmed exam torch and directing it into his pupils.

Meanwhile another still dripping wetsuit-clad surfer-type clarifies absolutely nothing by informing me that, "I's next in the line up, Doc, an' he's ridin' real good when suddenly he does this pearl- even though the wave were no macker and he never bogged it, so's we knows somethin's wrong."

"Had he stopped breathing?" I ask upon noting that my patient's pupils are reacting quite normally.

"Don' think so- we had him up on the board like fast," he answers in support of Mr. Surfer's present lack of laboured breathing.

I proceed to brush away the sand and expose Mr. Surfer's radial pulse. Distracted, I turn towards the noisome hue and cry of a massive aerial assault of vile seagulls that soon draws my attention to the nearby remnants of bystanders' now abandoned pasties, "Would someone pick up that mess- it's a health hazard!"

Of course not a single person moves or exhibits any sign of concern for the public health, all are no doubt more interested in the goings-on with Mr. Surfer and his fate- a flock mentality not much different from the feathered pestilence overhead.

"Doc, I'm fine now. Really," he nervously demurs as if all the attention was anything but welcomed.

"Right, which is why collapsing without actually managing to drown is nothing to be concerned about."

"You should see him ev'ry night at the pub then, Doc!" someone calls out for the collective amusement of the _profanum vulgus_.

"Ya know, since yer here, Doc- I expect you'd probably fancy a look at some seriously ripe crotch chafing." Mr. Surfer derisively turns on me to the delight of all the other hovering nuisances who cry out in raucous laughter.

"Use some soap and water! Or get some antiseptic from the Chemist!"

"We was jus' takin' bids Doc, and for twenty quid you'd be jammy to gimme some of that mouth-to-mouth!" he smirks to the swooned delight of the audience of females.

"I want you in my surgery for a complete examination," I stand to relinquish my present efforts without relinquishing any of my authority, let alone any further dignity. "This afternoon!"

"Hear that everyone, 'he wants me!' ", more laughter. "Oh, c'mon Doc- them lips of yours would resuscitate ol' Wrath**††**- if'n he was to wash up!"

"Today!" I stomp away shedding sand and stifled umbrage behind me as I go, "...inconsiderate... deranged... time-wasters..."

More sniggering trails behind me as I make my way back up the slipway, content to leave these abusive ingrates behind but still reluctant with the realization that even more of the same are likely congregating again at the surgery. A protracted breath and a forlorn glance across the harbour inspires me to check on a child at school I'm not happy about... Ah, no- never mind; not so urgent after all. Perhaps a brief detour then to look in on James... No, he'd be settling down by now for a well-earned midday nap.

I hesitate at the turn up the road and note the change in the day's weather from calm and clear to now vulnerable to rain with the sudden appearance of heavily laden clouds. As I stand, my eye catches the figure of a darkly reticent man seemingly lying in wait to, no doubt, cosh me with yet another insult. In the autonomic instant that weighs a response of either total disregard or acrimonious rebuke, I realize that the glower staring back at me belongs to the very reflection of myself in the window before me. He is not the intrepid figure I once imagined he'd be. There is weakness: though once better concealed before haemophobia ever came to wrack his daily existence. Foolishness too: as any attempt at navigating any sort of social milieu has always attested. I dismiss the dreary figure without a word and begin again the sisyphean trudge up Roscarrock Hill. There is, after all, my duty to fulfill.

.***

I enter to stand and behold, from just inside the doorway of the surgery, my former sanctum once again besieged by tiresome and fractious patients with Morwenna apparently reveling in her role as potentate in my brief absence.

"Just _do_ whate'er the Doctor tells you, Mr. Perrin!" she reprimands the fuming pensioner waving a prescription before her at her desk. "If you hate his bedside manner so much, best do _z'actly_ what he tells 'cause I can assure you- you're _really_ goin' to hate his _graveside_ manner!"

To which the angry sod turns sharply and storms out in seeming defeat but not before tossing me a stern, "Tosser!" for good measure as he passes.

"Hiya, Doc!" Morwenna smiles broadly with what seems a quasi-despotic grin before she takes a widely encompassing eyeful of the assembled patients, "Ready then?"

.***

I sit, _not quite, _listening to the current patient in my consulting room whilst giving him all the attention that my duty as a physician essentially demands, which is far more than he, or most of my patients for that matter, generally deserve. I am engrossed at times like these in the cognitive processes of examination, quantification, interpretation, and interrogation which with routine diligence yields a diagnosis and course of treatment. The latter, interrogation- that is to say talking to my patients (it's fair to say), is the most disagreeable of these. It involves patients' vague recollections of sparsely pertinent facts, customarily evasive answers, generally unresponsive replies, and long pointless tracts of irrelevant anecdotes- not to mention their penchant for wasting my time by prattling on with their life's story or inflicting me with meaningless tales of every ache and superfluous pain they've ever experienced or imagined.

Of course my job as GP grudgingly involves _some_ conversation with patients- a frequently avoidable task for a vascular specialist. Although short of an aortic dissection, my surgical patients contribute little verbally to diagnoses compared to what I routinely divined on my own in dissertation with the depths of their vasculature. Alas, interrogating patients these days involves a veritable chinwag in exchange for anything resembling a useful or meaningful response. Worse still, are the patients fluent in nothing but the language of whinging- of which Port Wenn knows no such shortage. Add to that rude, insulting, and ill-mannered and it describes my typical patient without ever having to mention their odd colloquial language or their utterly ridiculous accents.

I may be biased, but I find that James's language of babbling conveys far more to me than an average patient to my surgery. We do, my son and I, converse so well together despite the primitive language we share- in his case, that derived from his inability to thus far speak even his first monosyllable. Yet there is sufficient extenuation in that James is still well within his fourth-trimester**†††** of development and has still so much to learn: grasping, gesturing, sitting, crawling, standing erect, walking and running on two legs, reading, writing, and exploring the 96,000 kilometers of the body's blood vessels and tributaries- or mastering all the things that make an infant characteristically human**‡**. But we all must begin as tyros, and no less in our command of language. Although, the simple act of talking for males**‡‡** can be a special challenge that...

"So, Doc?" my patient finally interrupts my intelligent conversation _with myself_, "You... er... gonna tell me then whate'er it is I got?"

"Mr. Bandry, ahem..." I clear my throat for the chance to regather my thoughts, "we'll need to schedule a blood test, but the symptoms you've described together with my examination thus far are consistent with hypogonadism which..."

"So then yer 'spectin' to put me in hospital and cuttin' open me insides 'n such fer indecent pi'tures by snakin' me fulla microscope CCTV cameras, that's right innit Doc?"

"No, no hospital or surgery. The issue is addressed with a formulation of hormone replacement therapy."

"Ah... then you'll be puttin' me into one of 'em 'fensive machines and exposin' me with 'em... 'em... 'em... what are 'em called?... Radiation waves and magneto rays- all violatin' me internal organisms. That's right, innit?"

"No. No radiation."

"But yer tellin' me I'm to be jabbed with needles and tubes and stuck with stonkin' disgustin'... oh, what's 'em called?... Interjections! Yeah, interjections- interjections fulla drugs siphonin' into all me vitals. That's what yer sayin' then, eh Doc?"

"No. Treatment is generally administered transdermally- that is by a medicated patch placed on the skin either on your abdomen or on your thigh."

"Ah, then I 'spose yer tellin' me it's right serious, that I'm to be missin' work and to be bedrid fer weeks and weeks like some infernally disgraceful gaoler then, that's right eh, Doc?"

"No, it won't impose any limits to your level of activity."

"But then I'm to be 'umiliated as some sort of dozy thicko makin' me off my... off my... oh, what's the word I'm thinkin' Doc?"

"Ah... no, no. Cognition, tends to improve following treatment."

I watch him painstakingly absorbed in thought (as it were) as he, like too many patients for too long, torment themselves with outrageous hypothetical self-diagnoses and even more outlandish imagined treatments. They postpone a proper medical consult, only to finally skulk into my surgery; usually after their moronic procrastination has complicated an otherwise eminently treatable condition or once it has distracted them from an authentic and usually more insidious health concern. They idiotically imagine themselves to have all the time in the world to seek help and proper attention, when their ill-conceived delay really comes down to nothing more than an acute affliction of stupidity.

"Hmm..." he muses until his troubled pallor finally begins to recede until it is abruptly displaced by a gush of relief. "Giss on! Really- that's it?"

"Yes."

"Doc, I can't tell you 'ow long the wife's been bangin' on with one barmy idea'r after 'nother with every bleedin' mad thing she sees on the telly or 'ears from that puddled mother of 'ers tellin' me all the unspeakable embarrassments yer meanin' to subject on me. Ha!"

"It's a fairly standard treatment."

"Well, she gimme the sceamin' habdabs fer goin' on ages now, and 'ere you're tellin' me- from all yer years of doctorin', what a right footle it's all been!" his assuagement now overflows into ebullience.

"Yes."

"Ha! All this time I been havin' kit'ens 'bout comin' to see ya, fearin' all sorts of demeanin' indignities and now I'm knowin' I might ne'er 'ad so much as a care in the world!" he claps his hands together in a nearly manic gesture of relief. "Ho! I'm right proper 'shamed I did ne'er trust you Doc! Ya really knows yer onions bet'er than anyone, eh Doc?"

"Yes, quite right. But we'll still need to schedule that blood test and perform a digital examination first."

"Ah... yeah, right. Of course... I shoulda known... what a mug I am. You musta figured me fer a proper gockey then," he lowers his head and nods disconsolately for a prolonged time until he raises it again resolutely. "So, a digital exam it's to be then. I suppose you'll be usin' 'em big fancy digital gubbins with 'em electronics gismos..."

"Ah..."

"And hookin' me up with wires and down-loadin' me with electrobes and such fulla digital data..."

"Er..."

"All feedin' into 'em high-techno devices with 'em lights and flashin' numbers like 'em boffin's digital computers and such. That's right eh, Doc?"

"Mmm... no, not exactly," I stand to retrieve a pair of gloves and motion over to the exam table, "If you would step over there Mr. Bandry and remove your trousers and your pants...**‡‡‡**"

**2/8/13 to be continued...**

**(edited 2/24/13)**

* * *

**†levator labii superioris alaeque nasi**- the muscle that lifts the upper lip and dilates the nostril, allowing one to snarl. It is also notorious among medical students as the longest-named muscle in the human anatomy.

**††Wrath (or Ralph)- **a huge giant that once dwelt in a dangerously rocky gorge known as his Cupboard on the coastline near Portreath in North Cornwall from where he terrorized and devoured heedless fishermen.

**†††fourth-trimester**- a neologistic term for the first three months of a newborn's life which takes into account that human babies are born vastly more helpless and develop over a much longer period than any other animal.

**‡infant-** or _human baby_, is derived from the Latin _infans_ meaning "unable to speak" or "speechless" connoting that truly most characteristic of all human traits.

**‡‡**Boys generally lag behind girls in speech development, yet significant language delays are associated in boys following in utero exposure to high levels of testosterone (measured from cortical blood). The distinct _opposite_ occurs for female fetuses exposed in utero to high levels of testosterone (i.e. it _reduces_ the possibility of language delays in girls). Similar gender distinctions are manifest in various neurological disturbances known as _aphasias_ that affect the complex reticulum of speech and comprehension that affect men in 4 out of 5 cases.

**‡‡‡DRE or Digital Rectal Examination**


	9. Chapter 9: Grand Services

**Chapter 9: Grand Services**

"WE'RE NOT FINISHED! MR. BANDRY... COME BACK!" I call out across the waiting room to no avail. Although my mouth forms the next word meant to follow him out the surgery door, no utterance is proffered. Any choice anatomical malediction I might utter at this moment could be misconstrued as something of a differential diagnosis, and thus an unpardonable disclosure of patient confidentiality. Therefore my frozen visage reveals nothing but dismay and I reply to the expectant look on Morwenna's face without so much as a grunt, and retire to the kitchen for a well-earned espresso.

.***

I carefully tamp down the ground coffee and slide and lock the cup into the machine. With the push of a button, a conspiracy of water and temperature and pressure converge to conjure an extraction of caffeinated elixir. Its powerful stimulus will serve as substitute for another day's succession of patients devoid of the smallest measure of stimulus, intellectual or otherwise.

Standing at the kitchen window, I take the first long sip of coffee that traverses towards my bloodstream. Peering over the cup into the sparse view it affords, assures me that sunshine is still contesting the ominous clouds from before. Unbidden the same dark figure from earlier appears again in the glass before me. Before I have a chance to dismiss him, my attention is deflected by a small folded piece of note paper left on the sill. It says on the outside, "Martin," as I take it and open it to read:

_Martin,_

_Although these two days away will be hectic for you on your own:_

_Your tenderness alone prevailed that I should go,_

_and your tenderness together I long to return._

_Love, Louisa._

She's drawn ridiculous hearts around my name: silly, girlish, incongruous shapes, that bear no resemblance whatsoever to the actual cardioidal muscular organ. Still, I tuck the note gently into my breast pocket and wonder for a moment how Louisa's handful of words can make me feel... er...well, let's just leave it at that.

Communication between Louisa and I has always been- well, difficult. Trying to say the 'right' thing, let alone trying to understand what it is she's trying to tell me is at most times exasperating- even if I'm transfixed by how she says it. Nonetheless, we _have_ managed to develop a sensitive and nuanced language between us that is rich in subtlety and deep in deliberateness and still conveys great meaning and significance. This language, well- more of a dialect really, or whatever term the linguists would call it- just so happens to allow the two of us to discuss my medical patients without actually discussing my medical patients.

Given that my solemn duty of patient confidentiality is just that and notwithstanding Louisa not being a healthcare professional, this spontaneously developed quasi-language of ours allows us to share important information about a patient's behaviour, homeostasis, and emotional states that may reflect actual pertinent medical conditions. Likewise Louisa and I can share etiological concerns that can help me evaluate indications and contraindications. There have been patients like the girl with the fat bolshie mother who nearly met the fate Louisa had feared; or the mad headmaster whose behaviour had nearly put schoolchildren and Louisa herself at peril, amongst others. Of course apart from matters of public health, these delicate discussions are subject to a certain circumlocution and yet remain paradoxically notable for their unspoken medical-speak.

I suppose that this very same language might be recognizable as our own personal conversations- except for all the deliberateness, sensitivity, thoughtfulness, subtlety, and caring. "Hmm..."

"Yes?" I respond to the sensation of the receptionist's eyes boring into me.

"Shall I have Mr. Trewella go through and wait then?"

I respond by silently extending an open hand for the patient file she clutches whilst the other drains the last of the cup's defibrillating contents. I notice that affixed to the front of the file is a photo of an elderly man pointing to his throat near thelaryngeal prominence and emblazoned beneath in large red text, "Trewella, Mathew."

"Hmm."

.***

"You'll 'ave to speak up Doc, my hearin's not what it used to be."

"I was asking," I repeat my initial query but a good deal louder, "what seems to be the matter?"

"Well, it's me voice. Somedays it's as faint as a church mouse."

"Right," I cast one more glimpse over to the patient file before seating myself in the adjacent chair. "I'll just have a look in your mouth then- at your larynx, um... Mr. Trewella."

I don the exam headlamp and prepare the examination mirror. "I'm going to hold the mirror at the back of your throat, Mr. Trewella, and if you can manage it, I'll have you make a high-pitch 'ee' sound followed by a low-pitched 'aa' sound when instructed. Do you understand?"

"Yes, Doctor."

I precisely manoeuvre the exam mirror, which he tolerates well without the use of local anaesthesia, to provide a good view of the palate, throat, epiglottis, and of keenest interest: the vocal folds. He follows my directions obediently, permitting an adequate view of the vibrating tissues as he maintains a nicely sonorous, if slightly debilitated, timbre. I withdraw the instruments and offer him a glass of water.

"Mr. Trewella, your vocal folds do not come together evenly anymore and hence your voice has lost some of its acoustical strength," I explain in rather rudimentary terms. "It's known as _presbylaryngis_ and its onset is perfectly normal with your advancing age. It's not serious."

"Oh, but then it is serious, I need me voice for evensong," he says pensively.

"Ah, so you sing with the choir do you."

"Well, I sing to me wife ev'rynight. She likes to say me voice could lure all the saints back to Lyonesse."

"Mmm... then it would seem that your voice is getting sufficient exercise, in which case voice therapy alone probably won't be of much help."

"I been singin' for Morveren- that's me wife, oh, a long, long time now- that's me way of tellin' her how much I love 'er, you see. It was me singin' that made her geddy on so and bring me 'em pretty little flowers first time she come to 'ear me."

"Mr. Trewella, I could refer you to a specialist for a laryngoscopy using stroboscopy who may recommend a procedure of injections that could tighten the vocal folds," I continue as he nods comprehendingly. "It's not a complicated procedure and there'd be some follow up therapy to help rebuild vocal strength and improve articulation."

"S'pose that's what I was sayin' Doc- my singin' is me way of articulating my feelin's for Morveren, you see," his rheumy eyes glisten at me. "I 'spect we all have our own way of articulatin'- our feelin's, that is, fer 'em thats mean ev'rythin' to us, 'em we love. Jus' like I 'spect you do with your Miss Glasson."

"Mr. Trewella..." I begin to redress him sternly.

"Doc, Doc, I know what you're goin' to say- I once was standin' in 'em same shoes hearin' all the whispers about Morveren and me. In our lit'le village the tongues would wag mornin' 'til night from folks who ne'er knew no bet'er, sayin' the two of us would ne'er work out- like we was fish out of water or somethin'. I dare say you've heard 'em whisperin' the same 'bout you and Miss Glasson too, Doc."

"Mr. Trewella, anything you have to say about Miss Glasson and myself is none of your business! And I advise you not to join in with anyone in this village- with whispering or any other means, who imagines it to be theirs," my indignation finally erupts at his galling intrusion.

"I know, I know, Doc. You see, Morveren and me been together for 53 years and I learnt somethin' maybe you didn't. That is, there's not enough time to waste, not near 'nough time. Fer too long we'd ne'er stop besting if'n we should even be together- thinkin' maybe we was jus' too diff'rent- instead of heedin' all we was feelin'," he cast his eyes down with a long pause before continuing, "Morveren's passed away now, jus' this spring."

"Ah, your wife's died has she?"

"Oh, and I'd be missin' her somethin' terrible too, Doc, if'n I couldn't let her know ev'ryday all she means to me- you know, articulatin' our feelin's like. Love works out 'em gurt changes like yer job, where'n be home, yer chillurn and all.

"But I tellee what's true fer nothin': its 'em lit'le things, 'em ev'ryday things, the simple things what makes fer one another's happ'ness. That's what keeps me singin' to my Morveren and keeps us together fer always, you see. You remember that," he says looking piercingly into my eyes and shaking a kindly finger at me.

"Mr. Trewella, how about I write out that..."

"Imagine Doc, 'em lit'le flowers she gimme- I'll ne'er forget that first time she come to 'ear me. Said she'd knew 'em from backalong and all 'bout Lyonesse and the 'The City of Lions'**†**. Said fer the most precious sound she e'er 'eard, I was to 'ave the most precious things she e'er seen; all what she brung me- a han'ful of 'em beau'iful _dandelions_."

"... referral?"

_Taraxacum officinale_**†****†**: the scientific or Latin name for a plain, unassuming, generally unappealing, even undesirable weed widely deemed a nuisance of a flower to the ordinarily preoccupied, unobservant, and frenetic passersby who would curse it sooner than they might even bother to consider it in the first place. But to the earnest observer, dandelions are a special, meaningful, and immensely useful little flower known and treasured since long ago times for its numerous medicinal and nutritional qualities.

I recollect the same demure yellow flower from my childhood visits to Cornwall and the arcadian shelter of Auntie Joan's farm. From my earliest visits there, she would steep those flowers into a tea to soothe my upset stomach when faced with the return trip home to my parents. Often times Aunt Joan assigned me the duty to gather the flowers' fresh leaves, always plentiful during my summer visits, to be mixed in as part of the salads that she prepared with our supper.

One such flower once served to lure my boyhood lepidopteran quarry, but with it came an unwitting apian companion that gave me an angry sting when I tried to retrieve it. Auntie Joan took my hurt away by applying the milky sap from the stem of the very same flower. Then there were the rare occasions when I accompanied her on trips into the village that culminated with special treats of _Dandelion and Burdock _made from that very same oft-overlooked flower. The flowers were always plentiful on the farm, usually growing in great carpets where no one dandelion would ever need be alone, unlike me as I blew on their puffy white balls of seeds to make a wish that someday it might be true for me too.

My thoughts return to the times with dear Auntie Joan when I could actually be made to feel better; times when I could hardly believe there existed someone who wanted to make me feel better, who would care for me and care about me. So many of those recollections involved a bright yellow little flower that was otherwise overlooked by everyone and no one else really wanted around. It gently reminds me of the long ago origin of my deeply held reasons why I might care about anyone too and care for them by means of what I might actually be good at, by devoting all of myself to their very best medical care.

But there was another dandelion, from not so long ago, and more special still than all the others. I first cherished it for having been placed tenderly here, in my suit's lapel, by Louisa's own sweet hand. Just a matter of hours later, I would cherish it for quite a different reason when nothing else: not the expanse of my medical and surgical skills, not the breadth of my clinical insight or experience, and not all my years of medical education and training could do anything to heal or lessen the pain I knew to be my heart's breaking.

Through the dark and desolate night that followed, it was the presence of that flower that kept my heart from breaking completely and irrevocably with the knowledge that Louisa's heart would continue to beat. Somehow from that terrible night to the very next, that flower reminded me that not only would Louisa's heart continue to beat, but it might still beat for me. Later that very night I knew it _did_ beat for me- I'd felt it, both of them together; intimately and as it had never beat before (and with it, distant echoes of yet another heart to come). If only I could have articulated the words to keep us together rather than all the words that would only wound Louisa. If only I'd been able to articulate into words that flowed from my mouth from what so profusely flowed from my heart.

I am struck at this moment how after 53 years Mr. Trewella is seemingly living this day in love like their very first. Yet in all the time since I came to Port Wenn and have been in love with Louisa since, the fragment of time we've been together, by which I mean truly together, would hardly even amount to 53 days. Yet having been scarcely now one day apart, I'm missing her more than I could ever have expected to bear.

.***

"Mr. Trewella**†****†****†**, I'd like to find you the right specialist who can advise you on treatment to renew and strengthen your voice," a gentle voice is heard to say, which momentarily I fail to recognize as my own.

"Thank You, Doctor."

**2/24/13 to be continued...**

**(edited 3/23/13): spelling, ruined formating**

* * *

**†Lyonesse aka 'City of Lions'-** this fabled land once jutted out from present day's Land's End to the Isles of Scilly 50 km away and was home to over 140 villages. According to legend, the vast promontory sank into the sea in a single stormy night when everything was lost beneath the waves. The same land of Lyonesse is also the place of Arthurian legend as told in various tales including the site of King Arthur's birth (whilst others attribute Tintagel Castle), or the site of King Arthur's death (Morte d'Arthur), where Merlin battled and drowned Mordred and his armies, and the kingdom of Tristan's father in the story of Tristan and Iseult.

**††Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale)-** from the French _dent de lion_, meaning "lion's tooth" referring to the toothed shape of its leaves. The flowering plant is native to Eurasia and North and South America but now grows virtually everywhere in the world and is notably edible in its entirety (flowers, leaves, and roots).

******†****†**†The inspiration for Mathew and Morveren Trewella comes from the Cornish legend of _The Mermaid of Zennor _that takes place in that small village on the Penwith Peninsula of North Cornwall. Legend tells of a strikingly handsome young man who sings every evening with a voice so enchanting that a beautiful mermaid living in the nearby waters of Pendour Cove is enamoured by its sound. She covers herself and her tail and in the stealth of darkness to be lured ever closer to the church to discover the source of such wondrous singing. Eventually she comes close enough for their gaze to meet whereupon they both instantly fall madly in love. He promises to follow her wherever she goes, and as she must return to the sea or die, he follows her to live in the sea where they together make their home and family.


	10. Chapter 10: Sensibilité

**Chapter 10: Sensibilité**

"DOOOOOC?!" MORWENNA'S IMPLORING PLEA wastes little time conferring me with my next patient. "Looks like another victim of testosterone poisoning!"

"What?!" my head snaps in disbelief as I start to my feet.

"Looks like the matchin' book-end to the other patient," she aptly describes the thickset yob with the blotchy facial lesions facing me across the consulting room doorway.

"Right," I drawl in more time than it takes to deduce his diagnosis. "And, you must be?"

"Yes- he is," Morwenna responds.

"Related to Bobby..."

"...Billy," she again responds.

"His...?"

"...cousin," she says.

"Then you are both...?"

"...Yes- they are."

"On the same...?"

"...rugby team."

"Morwenna, may I please have a conversation with my patient!" I insist as the boy stands dumbstruck between us listening to our back and forth.

"Gosh, that's a first, Doc- you actually _wantin'_ a conversation with your patient!" Morwenna mockingly defends herself. "No need to thank me for tryin' to spare you the trouble fer what you won't find in 'em patient notes of yours."

Were I remotely near Morwenna's age, I would retort by saying all that need be said with a resounding roll of my eyes, but instead I take the opportunity to finally address my patient, "Mr...?"

"Oh, Tars. Umm... Eddie. Eddie Tars," he stammers at last, apparently now suffering from vertigo as well.

I turn to Morwenna daring to ask, "Would you bring me the other boy's file, _please_?"

"Of course, Doc," my evidently chastened receptionist answers.

"Mr. Tars, please come through," I invite him into the consulting room noting that he shares not only the same medical symptoms, but the same gormless manner as well.

"...since you asked _nicely_," Morwenna squeezes this comment through the door just as it clicks shut.

"You do indeed play rugby- don't you? You and your- cousin, is it?"

"Yeah, at school."

"I expect my examination will confirm my suspicion that you have contracted _herpes rugbiorum_."

"_Rugbi_... wha'? You're makin' that up, ain't ya?"

"Ah, no. _Herpes rugbiorum_ is related to _herpes gladiatorum_ which wrestlers- as in 'gladiators', are also susceptible. It's a form of the herpes simplex infection which is transmitted by skin-to-skin contact. Does the rash extend down your left arm and shoulder then?"

"Yeah, hurts too," he answers with a persistent confused look that I'm fairly certain is a terminal condition.

"Have you seen or spoken to your cousin lately?"

"No. I been off school lookin' like this."

"Well, I can disclose to you that your cousin has similar symptoms with the rash appearing on his _right_-side."

"Ahh..." he says effortfully whilst slowly working out the geometry. "Nice one, Doc! I heard you was good."

"_Scrumpox_."

"Huh?"

"You may have heard it called by its more common name, _scrumpox_- it's the same thing. I'll need to finish my examination, but now I can start you on a specifically targeted antiviral treatment. You'll still need to avoid contact with others, at least for a few more days."

"How'd I get this then?"

"Perhaps your cousin, or another player, or from the equipment you were sharing. I'll need to get the names of all the other players and I'll contact the school too, of course. All the players will need to practice better hygiene before games to avoid exposure to sores or cuts or any broken skin and the equipment must all be properly disinfected after every use. Now that I know what it is, I'll ring your cousin for the same treatment."

"Or not," he says blankly adamant, "He's a real git, ya know."

"Was there anything else?" I ask reflecting for a moment on just how little he's volunteered thus far into his consultation.

"Yeah..." he says with the kind of pause that, in my experience, usually precedes divulgence of some sort of embarrassing symptom or terrible secret. "Well, I was kinda wonderin'- your receptionist, she got herself a boyfriend or anythin'?"

"Take this," my words simultaneously provide him with his prescription and serve to dismiss him personally and from my consulting room. "Have it filled right away and start the course immediately and the blisters will begin to recede."

I'm interrupted by a knock at the door, "Come."

Morwenna enters to place the prior patient's file on my desk. "Morwenna, take Mr. Tars here to write out a list of names for all the rugby players he's had any contact with in the last ten days. Then you can begin ringing them up to inform them of their potential exposure. Have them make appointments to see me as soon as possible."

"Doc?" she anxiously sidles over to me to ask in barely hushed tones, "Oesday isthay eanmay iway ottagay orryway 'boutway ettin'gay ate'erwhay itway isway e'shay otgay enthay?"**†**

"Morwenna, just do your job! If you were ever at any risk, whatsoever- I would inform you immediately. As long as you avoid all physical contact with him, you're not at any risk."

"No problem there!" she says with a roll of her head and distended eyes and begins to lead him away to her desk.

"Hold on," my mind is not quite finished with this patient and insists that I question him further before sending him on his way. "I'm thinking about something your cousin said."

"Yeah?"

"Did you suffer from severe diarrhea or a prolonged stomach illness over the summer as well?"

"Umm... yeah, had it bad 'round when school first started."

"And what about now? Do you have any persistent symptoms like abdominal pain, diarrhea, loose or bloody stools?"

"No. It jus' went away on its own after a bit- didn't never need to do nuthin'."

"Hmm... is it possible that you shared a meal or ate some infected food together with your cousin prior to the illness?"

"Er, no I don't think so," which was rather not the answer I was hoping for... "Oh, but we both was helpin' at my Uncle's farm 'round that time."

"But you didn't eat anything together?"

"No, my Aunt can't cook to save a life. And if I never eat mutton again, it'll be too soon," he answers to my now disheartened expression.

Epidemiology is a specialized field within medicine that is devoted to the causes, patterns, probabilities, and analysis of the exposure, transmission, virulence, and distribution of pathogens and harmful microbes. It relies upon logical and stochastic analysis, mathematics, statistics, and biology to draw the links between an outbreak of disease and the affected population. To explain these links, epidemiologists will attribute to these pathogens a sort of collective intelligence; a clever, cunning, and often deadly form of intelligence. Yet to make the link, they must simultaneously regard the human targets of these pathogens as, to put it bluntly, about as _dumb_ as people can possibly be. Moreover, this _is_ Port Wenn.

"We was carin' for the new sheep though," he mentions as an afterthought to my silence.

"Is it possible they were sick and you didn't handle them properly? Maybe you didn't do the washing up properly afterwards?"

"No... don't think so- didn't notice if any of 'ems been sick. Besides 'em stupid sheep got this disgustin' greasy feeling, you know. So I keep gloves on like the whole time."

I've now nearly exhausted my diagnostic battery of questions for all the probabilities that kept asserting themselves. Nonetheless, I'd sooner believe in sentient fire engines than I'd believe in mere coincidence.

"And your cousin- he was doing the same, I mean the same kind of contact wearing gloves as well?"

"Yeah..." a great long pause ensues. "We did sorta take turns at it though, you know. He sorta dared me to do it and all."

"Dared you what? What is '_it_'?"

"Well, you know. We was takin' turns at dockin' the tails of all 'em new lambs and well, the new rams too, you see. See which one of us was the bigger man to do it."

"What, like a competition?" I was beginning to imagine a more advanced version of 'the dares club' for the most precocious of imbeciles.

"No, no, no, nothin' like that. Well, not really. We just had to do it fast and clean-like, you know take 'em off fast- makes 'em easier to manage and tastes better when they're cooked, so I'm told. Plus it keeps 'em from acting all stupid all the time with all 'em girl sheep," his interpretation of 'the bigger man' was increasingly circumspect judging by the look on Morwenna's face at this very instant.

"But you're sure that the two of you never so much as shared a meal or ate anything together over this period?"

"No, like I said... Well, we did take care of 'em rams in the traditional way though. They is a lot stronger than they look, ya know. They're tryin' to get loose and they ain't easy to hold on to, and you're tryin' not to get kicked, so umm... yeah, you use your teeth."

"Your teeth! You used your teeth?!" I squall incredulously.

"Yeah, it's traditional. Takes 'em bollocks clean off. Been done like that for hundreds of years too..."

"Your teeth!**††** You mean, with your mouth?!" both Morwenna and I blurt out in horrified unison.

"Well, it's all perfectly normal, ya know."

Morwenna and I look at one another too speechless to say what volumes of words could never hope to say, before turning back to the patient, mouths and eyes completely agape.

"Stop lookin' at me like I'm some sorta nutter!

"I ain't bodmin, ya know.

"I'm not!"

"Right," I say with characteristic brevity when the idiot doth already protest too much**†††**. "But, I'm still going to take some blood and samples for analysis. Morwenna, when I'm done with him, make sure he gives you that list of names. Mr. Tars, you can manage a stool sample, can't you?"

.***

Morwenna reenters with the list of names she's collected, "Here it is, Doc. He sure is a bright spark that last patient, eh? An addle pate so he is, bit of a dobeck, a real gockey, one daft arpath, a buffle-head fer sure, a culiak if e'er I seen one, a total droojy...

"Morwenna, enough! Leave the diagnoses to me, I'm the doctor," which in itself sets me to wonder whether my prolix receptionist might possibly suffer from logorrhoea**‡** (or rather to say she inflicts her suffering on me).

"Sorry, Doc. I jus' wanted to assure you that he'll not be botherin' me anymore. Actually, he'll be countin' hisself lucky that I let him off so easy."

"Mmm," I grunt my morbid disinterest and return to my patient notes.

"Well, since you insist: there was this giant see, a real Giant, a real big, _dumb_ giant. He tormented everyone fer miles around and he's like always chattin' up this one girl, see; tellin' her he loves her and all. Well, this girl- Agnes is her name, wants to be rid of 'im so she tells 'im that if he can prove his love fer her then they can be together forever. So she tells 'im the proof is to jab hisself and to fill up a hole in the cliffs nearby with his blood.

"Anyways, he goes to do it, you see. But he's so _dumb_ that he never realizes that there's these cracks like down at the bottom of the hole. In other words, it's a completely bottomless hole and because he's so stupid, he ends up bleedin' to death and..."

"Exsanguination," I say for her edification whilst gulping heavily. "It's called exsanguination- bleeding to death."

"Yeah- not bad, eh Doc? They made her a Saint after that, Saint Agnes- that's where this all happened, see. She like saved the whole village from being harassed by this stupid giant**‡‡**- and herself too, of course. Well, pretty much everyone left her alone after that," she pauses barely long enough to draw breath. "Not the same way they left Saint Morwenna alone for whate'er it was she done- or as the case may be, what she ne'er done at all. Thanks again for that, Mum."

A last blank look at my receptionist serves to reprimand her for her idleness- with the regular exception of her mouth.

"Sorry, Doc..."

"Mmm."

"I hope I'm not gonna cause you nightmares now: you know, thinkin' 'bout all 'em giant pools of blood? Endless cascades of blood pouring out, gushin' everywheres, that you can't stop? Like fountains of bright red, warm, metallic, thick, slippery blood that jus' flows and flows and..."

**3/23/13 to be continued...**

* * *

**†**For non-fluent speakers of backslang (aka _pig latin_), Morwenna is asking, "Does this mean I gotta worry 'bout gettin' whate'er it is he's got then?"

**††**This (I hate to say) is an authentically traditional practice still frequently employed as a method of sheep castration in places including the UK and the U.S.A. (no, really).

**†††**Shakespeare, William: Hamlet, Act II, Part II,1602 is Polonious's long-winded assertion to Hamlet's mother that Hamlet is, indeed, mad. Whereas Hamlet, Act III, Part II is the remark by Hamlet's mother that a repeated insistence to the contrary proves otherwise and thereby implicates herself in the murder of Hamlet's father (the very source of Hamlet's madness).

**‡logorrhoea-** an excessive flow of words or inconcise use of words which may present in a variety of psychiatric or neurological disorders including aphasias.

**‡‡Bolster the Giant-** a giant who dwelt amongst the coves of St. Agnes in Cornwall and, according to legend, gobbled up unsuspecting villagers as well as their sheep and cattle. Knights, noblemen, and swaggering locals hoped to prove their manhood by fighting him but none could prevail against the savage ogre (or his digestion). The giant and his unwelcome attentions towards Agnes were finally ended by the wiles of the young maiden exactly as described. The event is celebrated and reenacted every year with the festival of Bolster Day in the village of St. Agnes where the stains of blood on the cliffs can still be found.


End file.
